


As Long As My Blood Flows

by TheRealEvanSG



Category: Naruto
Genre: Aquaphobia, Chakra-Sensitive Protagonist, F/F, F/M, Fear of Drowning, Femboy Protagonist, M/M, Naruto is Naruko, Not Overpowered Protagonist, Original Kekkei Genkai, Self Insert, Self Insert as Original Character, fem!naruto, original clan
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:02:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25965544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheRealEvanSG/pseuds/TheRealEvanSG
Summary: A refugee from Kirigakure, all of the civilians in Konohagakure treat Kawase Ren like he'll betray the Village the first chance he gets. But Ren has his own troubles; he's the clan heir, his clan's kekkei genkai is Fluid Release but he's terrified of water, and oh, there's the little fact that he's been reincarnated into a world that'll happily destroy him at a moment's notice. Oh, also, Naruto's a girl? What?-Self Insert
Comments: 3
Kudos: 38





	1. Remembrance

[“Kawase-san.”]

_It was a hot, steamy day under the Ohioan sun in the middle of summer. My mom, desperate to get me out of the house and do something with me, anything to get me off of my computer, had pulled me to Chippewa Creek, where we rushed over the roaring river, bouncing and splashing over the rapids. My mom’s brown locks fluttered in the wind as she turned to grin at me._

_“Isn’t this fun?” Her voice, deeper in pitch than the average woman but laced with joy, rang out through the water in my ears._

_I raised an eyebrow at her, a soft smile of my own curling up on my lips in spite of myself. “It’s a level 5 river. If it’s not fun, somebody’s doing something wrong somewhere.”_

[“Ka-wa-se- _san._ ”]

_My soaked shirt weighed heavy upon my chest, clinging around the slight ‘beer belly’ developing on me due to my sugar intake. My shorts weren’t as wet as my shirt, mostly because my mom and I had had a splash war with my shirt taking the full force of it. In my pocket, my waterproof Galaxy blasted music into the air. I threw my head back and sang along, voice belting into the air, uncaring whether I was off-key:_

_“I used to think maybe you loved me now baby I'm sure_

_And I just can't wait till the day when you knock on my door_

_Now every time I go for the mailbox, gotta hold myself down_

_'Cause I just can't wait 'til you write me you're coming around”_

[“Kawase Ren!”]

_“I'm walking on sunshine (Wow!)_

_I'm walking on sunshine (Wow!)_

_I'm walking on sunshine (Wow!)_

_And don't it feel—"_

_Suddenly, I was weightless. Tumbling, falling through the air, my stomach dropping a million miles into the ground. Someone cried out, and water filled my mouth. I choked on it, fear gripping me as I sucked in water, not air. My arms flailed as I quickly sunk—Pain erupted in my head. The rapids battering against me turned red; I’d hit my head off a rock._

_Choking. Choking. Gagging, begging for air, a sharp pain searing through my brain from the wound on my skull. I’d always been a good swimmer. I’d been on the swim team as a kid. Gotten a second place in the backstroke, even. I fought against the water with all my might, but I couldn’t tell up from down due to how the rapids tossed me around with abandon, and the flow of the river was too strong for me to fight against, anyway. Two more sharp pains, one in my arm and the other in my leg, rose up as I was slammed into more rocks with the force of a truck._

_My vision, already blurry and unfocused due to the water, began to dim._

“KAWASE-SAN! WAKE UP!”

I jumped a mile and almost tipped back in my chair, blinking rapidly. I flailed my arms a bit and righted myself, panting a few times. Wow, that had been unnecessarily scary. Blearily, I rubbed my eyes, then glanced up into the glare of Iruka-sensei, who frowned deeply at me. As my eyes slowly focused and I returned to a greater state of wakefulness, I realized where I was; Iruka-sensei’s classroom. My fellow classmates stared at me, except for Shikamaru, who looked like he couldn’t be bothered by something so troublesome (and who likely just got reprimanded for the same thing), and Sasuke, who simply didn’t give a fuck.

I blinked once, twice, then swallowed.

“N-Now, Iruka-sensei, I can ex… ex…” My mind stalled a moment as I tried to remember the word for _explain_ that I was looking for. This language… it was so _strange_ , much different from the language that I was born speaking. “I can ex… explain—” I said weakly, but Iruka shook his head.

“This is the fourth time this week, Kawase-san,” he told me in a softer tone. The contours of his face were strong and defined, his eyes soft and gentle. They were a warm brown, and even the horizontal scar across his face and nose didn’t remove from his kind aura. “I know you’ve had trouble sleeping ever since you were a baby, but that doesn’t forgive you sleeping during class. You’ll serve a detention along with Shikamaru.”

Shikamaru flinched, and my eyes flicked over to him. Yep, just as I’d thought.

Guiltily, I looked down and studied my desk. “…I’m sorry, sensei.”

“Wrong I’m. _Atashi wa_ is for girls, Kawase.” I winced and let out an awkward laugh as the class giggled at my expense. He sighed and rubbed his head. “Look, I know, and I know you get good grades anyway, but still. Try to pay attention more.” His gaze lingered on me for a moment. “You look pale, and you were whimpering in your sleep. Was it another nightmare?”

I paused, blinking as I tried to remember what I’d been dreaming about. Something about… music? I couldn’t recall. I’d had odd dreams ever since I was a baby, but I was never able to remember any of them. By the time I woke up, they’d always retreat to my subconscious. “I don’t know,” I said after some time. “But I don’t feel good.”

Iruka-sensei’s frown deepened, now in concern, as even Sasuke lifted his head up to look at me for a few moments before turning back. Sasuke probably knew a thing or two about nightmares. “Do you need to talk about anything after school?” he offered; Iruka always worried over my nightmares. I had more than probably anyone in our class. Maybe the entire school.

I shook my head weakly. “I’m okay, Iruka-sensei.”

“Alright.” He raised an eyebrow like he didn’t quite believe me, and he probably shouldn’t. “If you say so.” He walked away from my desk, moving back to the chalkboard. “Now, class, with that aside, let’s continue. What is the major difference between throwing a throwing star and a kunai…?”

Next to me, Ami, a purple-haired little shit, smirked at me cruelly. “Dunno why Iruka-sensei worries over you so much,” she said quietly in a sing-song voice more innocent than she was. “Kiri traitor.”

I flinched at that, glaring at her and growling, “I’m _not_ a traitor to Konoha. My clan came here to give the village our strength.”

She turned her nose up. “Never trust a Kiri-nin bearing gifts.”

I took a deep, shaky breath and purposefully ignored her. It was useless convincing bitches like her with just my words. My hands curled into fists.

_I’ll show them… I’ll show them all._

_I’m not a traitor._

After class and detention ended, I walked home to the Kawase Clan Compound by myself. A half-hour from the Academy, the Compound sat on the edge of the main part of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, just at the start of the forested area within the city walls. It was a quiet, calm area, the houses made of brick and mortar. They all surrounded a lake which we had named Lake Tomoe, after the late clan head’s wife, Kawase Tomoe.

Kawase Tomoe and her husband, Kawase Dansui, were born and raised in Kirigakure, the Village Hidden in the Mist, where the Kawase Clan originated and had made their home for time immemorial. In Dansui’s time, the Clan was huge, one of the largest Clans in Kiri. Now only three families remained, including my adopted parents.

It was because of these origins that as I walked home, hands in my pockets and face staring at the path beneath me, I received ugly stares from the civilians in Konoha. Stares that I made a conscious effort to ignore.

Stares that, no matter how much I tried, I could still feel baring upon my back.

When I got home, I was shaking with anger.

Mother sat in the shallow part of Lake Tomoe, just before the shore. She meditated, cross-legged, her hands held upside-down with her fingers in basically an ok-symbol.

I tentatively stepped into the water towards her, my heart racing. Aunt Kiyomizu’s disapproving words echoed through my head.

_“It is not good for a Kawase to be afraid of the water.”_

“M-Mother,” I said with a short bow. As my waist bent, I could see myself in the reflection of the water. One could mistake me for a girl if they did not know me prior; my facial features were very soft and rounded, my smooth, blackish-navy hair flowing past my shoulders. My eyes, as blue as the depths of the ocean, gazed back at me. I was shorter than the average male my age, and my eyes had bags underneath them from lack of sleep.

Mother, a tall woman with dark green hair and eyes a similar shade to mine, did not move. Her flowing black robes with the Kawase Clan symbol sat completely still on her curve-less body. “Ren,” she greeted softly, not breaking her position, “Your voice breaks and your chakra shivers. You are still not used to the water.”

Shame flowed through my veins. “I… Y-Yes, mother.”

“You are late.” She slowly stood up, water pouring off her waist as she turned to consider me. “Did you receive another detention, Ren?”

I pursed my lips and shifted about. “I did, mother. I could… I couldn’t sleep again last night, and…”

She held her gaze, and I could feel her eyes on me even as I stared down at the water’s surface. “I see,” she said quietly, a troubled tone in her voice. “And you still do not remember the nightmares?”

“No, m-mother.”

_{Choking. Choking. Gagging, begging for air._

_Can’t breathe. Can’t breathe. I can’t breathe!}_

I tensed, my heart pounding in my chest. I needed to get out of the lake. I didn’t know why, but every nerve in my body screamed at me to. Since as long as I could remember, large bodies of water terrified me, and I had no idea why. Even smaller bodies of water, even baths, I never felt comfortable in. Entire lakes? _Ha!_ Fuck no!

Aquaphobia. How ironic for someone from the Land of Water. How ironic for someone with my Clan’s kekkei genkai. How ironic for the Kawase Clan heir.

_“Failure,”_ the voices belonging to the survivors of my clan whispered.

_“Traitor,”_ the voices belonging to the civilians whispered.

I licked my dry lips. “Mother, can we please get out of the water?”

Disappointment flitted through her eyes, before she sighed and nodded. “Yes, dear. Come, your father has been wanting to train you this evening.”

We walked out of the water, Mother stepping out first. When she reached the shore, her clothes were dry. I stepped ashore after her, and closed my eyes, imagining all of the water on and in my body. I sent chakra through my blood, my clan’s kekkei genkai activating. The chakra control had to be precise, but luckily for Kawase Clan members, we were naturally gifted at chakra control.

My chakra pulled water out through my sweat glands on my feet, manipulating it to wrap up over my shoes. The tendrils of water connected with the water on my shoes, and my control shifted to gain access to said water. Soon, my shoes were dry, and a small puddle sat beside my feet. The tendrils of water connected to said puddle retreated and pulled back into my body.

Fluid Release—the ability to use chakra to freely manipulate the liquids in my body, and any liquid that comes into contact with my own chakra-infused body fluids. This was what drove our clan to become one of the biggest and strongest clans in Kirigakure… and also what drove us to what would nearly be our downfall.

Mother led me around to the other side of the lake, where I could see my father running through taijutsu katas. When we approached and his eyes landed on me, a cheery twinkle rose in them.

“Ah, Ren, there you are!” my father said, grinning widely. “You should be more aware of your surroundings!”

I blinked, thrown off. “Wait, what? Why should I be—” My chakra flitted out and felt his. I paled. Shit. That wasn’t my actual father.

“FATHER... _TACKLE_!”

“Uh oh.”

A heavy body slammed into me from behind and sent me comically tumbling to the ground, skidding across the grass as strong arms wrapped around me from behind and tried to wrestle me into submission. I squirmed and writhed in my dad’s grip as the figure running through katas disappeared in a puff of smoke, replaced with water that broke apart and fell. My mother shook her head in exasperated fondness as Father and I wrestled.

“Stupid… father…” I griped as I tried to shove his head into the dirt with my palm. “Is this any way to treat your eight-year-old son when he gets home!? You don’t even say _how was your day?_ ”

“Yes, yes it is!” my father teased, shifting his balance and shoving MY head into the ground, wrapping one arm around my leg and pulling it up to keep me off-balance. “It builds character!”

“Does anything _not_ build character to you!?” I kicked the hand grasping my leg with my free leg, and his grip loosened enough for me to yank away from him. I jabbed my elbow into his chest and scampered out from under him, scrambling to my feet. A victorious grin spread across my lips. “Ha! Take that!”

“Not bad,” said my dad with a smirk, rushing at me and throwing a punch out which I dodged; but while I dodged, he swept behind me and forced me into a choke hold. “But you still lack speed and reaction time!”

“Ack! Uncle, uncle!”

“Ahahaha!” Father’s laugh boomed out across the lack as Mother just sighed. This was commonplace for us, and she’d just gotten used to it by now. “This old man’s still got it in him!”

“You’re, like, forty!” I protested as he released me. I stuck my tongue out at him. “You’re not old!”

“Old for a shinobi!”

I rolled my eyes, grinning. “Yeah, yeah. So, Mother said you are wanted to train me?”

“Mother said you _were wanting_ ,” Father corrected me, waggling his finger in my direction. “Work on that grammar of yours, Ren. A shinobi who cannot communicate is no shinobi at all!” He beamed, giving me a thumbs up. “But yes, I do indeed wish to train you. You are already quite skilled at manipulating your chakra, but you need to get over your fear of water. And I don’t mean erase it, little lotus. I mean learn how to deal with it so that it doesn’t get in the way. I know you hate meditating. I know spending time thinking about all that water makes you nervous. Which is why I have come up with a new training method!”

A bead of sweat rolled down my cheek, and I swallowed. “And what would this training method be?”

“Don’t worry, dear,” Mother said, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Your Father will be right beside you, and I’ll have some cucumbers made with vinegar and oil waiting for you when you get back.”

I hesitated. “…Uh…” Now I really _was_ worrying. Just what hairbrained scheme had my father come up with now?

Father pointed to the river that fed Lake Tomoe, grinning. “Meditating on the rocks in the river!”

I swallowed, eyes widening and my heart pounding. “O-Oh. Very fun,” I choked out, my voice hoarse and my face pale.

“Come, Ren, there is little time to waste,” Father said, turning and heading off. The river headed the opposite direction from the village, and had some pretty fast rapids around the rock outcropping where my dumb Father had pointed to. I swallowed and shifted about, not wanting to go, but a push upon my back from Mother had me stumbling forward. I carefully walked in Father’s wake, casting nervous glances to the river beside us.

After fifteen minutes, we reached the spot where my training would take place. Rocks of various reddish browns and brownish blacks stuck up, smoothed down by eons of erosion. They were spaced apart in such a way that they could be walked across, towards two tall rocks that rose up out of the water above the rest. Water kept getting flung up high enough that we’d be getting wet even if we sat on the top of these.

At least we weren’t actually meditating _in_ the river.

“I’ll go first, and you follow me, Ren,” Father instructed.

I swallowed and nodded as he easily stepped onto the first rock, then the second, then the third, then the fourth, and at last made it to his rock. He found a flat surface to reach, then climbed up to the top and sat cross-legged. A gulp rolled down my throat, and I very, very gingerly followed suit.

The rocks were covered in moss from the river and very slippery. Balancing on them proved difficult. My heart hammered against my ribs and I desperately tried to find the flattest surfaces I could. Those rapids looked fast, dangerous.

{ _“I used to think maybe you loved me now baby I'm sure_

_And I just can't wait till the day when you knock on my door”_ }

I glanced up; Father’s eyes were already closed, and his breathing even. Meditating like this, one could hardly tell that he was anywhere near as boisterous as he really was. He had a really square jaw, and as… ambiguous as I was, he was as masculine as you could get. We looked nothing alike. Probably because he was only my Father in name only. Neither he nor my mother had any real, blood relation to me.

Both of my real parents, the Clan Head and his wife, were dead. Slaughtered in cold blood during Water Country’s Great Kekkei Genkai Purge.

Refugees without a leader. That was what my clan was, and I was supposed to grow up to be that leader.

I paused on the third rock and took a breath, calming my nerves.

I needed to shape up if I was going to become the Clan Head. I needed to shape up if I was going to prove all the civilians wrong and show that I’m a true Konoha shinobi, that I’m _not_ a secret weapon for Kirigakure.

{“ _Now every time I go for the mailbox, gotta hold myself down_

_'Cause I just can't wait 'til you write me you're coming around”_ }

I lifted my foot up and shifted my weight, lowering it towards the fourth rock. It landed, and I lifted my other foot up. Steady, steady, steady…

Then, all of a sudden, my breath caught in my throat and the world flipped upside down.

My foot slipped out from underneath me, the mossy rocks too slippery for me to keep my balance. My stomach dropped, and terror pierced through me. More terror than when I’d learned that Sasuke’s entire Clan had been completely wiped out, and it had been done by his own brother, and I’d come home crying, asking my mom if we were next. I plunged into the water, my body twisting and the back of my head bashing off the fourth rock as a cry of pure fear tore out from my lungs.

A sharp pain, worse than anything I’d ever felt, pierced through me. It was even worse than the time I’d broken my arm sparring with Kiba. And with it, visions flowed through my head as I sunk into the water.

_A single house, standing atop a hill surrounded by corn and soy fields._

_A woman the same age as mother, with brown hair instead of green._

_An older sister, my parents getting divorced, spending time on my computer because I hated everyone in my town, anime, Naruto, my average job at a gas station, Ohio, the United States, drowning, drowning, DROWNING—_

“REN!”

My dad yanked me out of the river, cradling me and hugging me tight. “Ren, Ren, stay with me! Stay with me, dammit!” He jumped out of the river, landing softly and laying me across the ground. “Dammit!” He pumped his hands into my chest in a steady rhythm. “Come on, come on!” After forty pumps, I choked and spat out a disturbing amount of water. Another few presses, and more water came out.

After a short while, I was at last able to suck in a much-needed breath, my lungs filling with wonderful, delicious air. A startled, terrified laugh escaped me as I lay there, my Father performing CPR on me.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Chakra, kekkei genkai, Kirigakure, Konohagakure, Iruka-sensei, the Academy, the Uchiha Massacre, the Hokage, Naruto—

Fuck.

“Ren, Ren, are you okay?” my Father demanded, face ashen as he stared at my rising and falling lungs.

“I’m alive,” I gasped, sitting up and gingerly holding my sore head. “I’m alive…”

More than that, I had reincarnated.

_Fuck._

I had reincarnated _into the Naruto series_. And I was royally, supremely, MAJOR-LEAGUE fucked.


	2. Notes and Sushi

I was taken to the hospital to treat my headwound, where it was discovered that I maybe had a little bit of a concussion. Hard strikes to the back of the head against very dense rocks will do that to a feminine guy. And… _whoa_ , did I look a like a girl. Like, seriously, I never realized _just how much_ I looked like a girl until now. The fact that I wore unassuming white robes that did not strictly adhere to any gender norms certainly didn’t help.  
  
But… Well. I was pretty cute.  
  
So I was… fairly okay with that.  
  
Anyway, the medical-nin prescribed me some medicine for the headache throbbing in the back of my skull and some rest from school. That was fine for me, because I needed some time to figure out _what the fuck I was going to do_ , as well as go over all of the information I had learned in the eight years leading up to my remembrance of my past life.  
  
When we returned home, my very worried Mother wrapped me up in a hug and squeezed me so tight I thought I’d need to make a return trip to the hospital.  
  
“You’re okay,” she whispered, cupping my cheeks and gazing into my eyes. “Don’t ever worry me like that again. If we were to lose you on top of your parents…” She shuddered, painful memories fluttering through her mind. Her eyes squeezed shut and she buried me in her shoulder. “I thought I’d lost you.”  
  
I froze, unsure how to handle this. After a moment, I hugged her back. “It’s okay. All I have is a concussion, Mom.” …And maybe some added trauma to potentially make my aquaphobia worse.  
  
…Concerning.  
  
“And thank the gods for that,” she whispered, squeezing me again before letting go.  
  
We had some dinner after that, and as promised earlier, my mother made me my favorite (healthy) snack to go along with it. Our house was a two-story, not anything special because our family had yet to require a lot of wealth after the devastation of our clan. Like the other Kawase Clan houses surrounding Lake Tomoe, it was a brick house, and it was made up of one main two-story cube with an attic, as well as a rectangular pop-off with a slanting roof to the right, a chimney behind the house, and a slanting roof over my mother’s farm. A clearing of trees spanned several acres around the back. The dining room was quaint, consisting of an ovular table with four chairs pulled up to it, a wine and sake rack, and a potted flower bought from the Yamanaka flower shop. It connected to the kitchen, and a wall with a doorless entryway separated it from the living room. The living room was simple, too; a coffee table sat between two couches, both dark leather, and all of these bits had a dark-blue patterned carpet beneath it. A grandfather clock had been pushed up diagonally against the corner. A closet next to this contained several high-quality senbon, swords, knives, throwing stars, spools of ninja wire, and kunai. Two bookshelves sat beside the entry way to the kitchen, and a staircase to the second floor hugged the south wall.  
  
The coffee table had a shogi table on it, and storage baskets beneath containing various other games and utilities.  
  
All in all, it was a pretty quaint place.  
  
That wasn’t what I was thinking about when I left the dining room and swept into the living room, plopped myself on the couch, and pulled a notebook and pencil from the storage beneath the coffee table, however.  
  
 _Okay, let’s see. What matches up with these memories I have and what doesn’t? Is this just some weird side effect of me having a concussion or are these actually memories of an actual past life?_  
  
Dying from drowning certainly would have explained the aquaphobia I have, and why it gets worse with larger bodies of water. And if my subconscious still had all those memories floating around somewhere back there, that’d explain the nightmares, too. I tapped the pencil to my chin, a troubled frown crossing my lips. Now, if I really was in the realm of the Naruto franchise, exactly how much was canon and how much was not?  
  
 _Rin and Obito are no longer here. Check._ I’d seen Kakashi around Konoha, though I hadn’t known who he was. He was the ONLY member of Team Minato I’d seen.  
  
 _Minato and Kushina died sealing the Kyuubi inside Naruto._ Check. The Kyuubi attack had occurred as depicted. Every October the village mourns the previous Hokage’s death and celebrates the defeat of the Nine-Tails. I frowned, pausing as my head throbbed and something about that poked at my brain, but I shrugged and moved forward.  
  
 _Major clans in Konoha are the Yamanaka, Nara, Akimichi, Uchiha, Senju, Hyuuga, Aburame, Inuzuka, and Sarutobi._ All that checked out.  
  
 _Hyuuga Hinata, heir to the Hyuuga, gets kidnapped by Kumogakure in what comes to be known as the Hyuuga Affair. Hinata’s father killed the attempted kidnapper, resulting in Hinata’s uncle dying to satisfy Kumogakure._ Check. What a bloody mess that was. And I do mean bloody in every sense of the word… Poor Hinata had always been shy and quiet as long as I’ve known her. If the Memories were correct, this was a direct result of the fallout of that mess.  
  
 _In Kirigakure, the Kaguya Clan attacked and was slaughtered. This caused Water Country to greatly distrust kekkei genkai users, leading to widespread racism and discrimination, and eventually all-out genocide._ Check. My own clan was proof of that. We were so small and weak now, and we even had to flee our own home for our very lives.  
  
I swallowed and shivered at the thought, then my pencil returned to the paper.  
  
 _The young prodigy Itachi and Obito caused the Uchiha Massacre after a long period of tension between the villagers and the Uchiha. Uchiha Itachi and Uchiha Sasuke are the last official survivors of the Uchiha Clan, and Sasuke was tortured by the Sharingan to the point that his only thought is to kill his older brother._ Massive check. I remembered THAT incident very well. It had happened this past year, and had absolutely terrified me. I’d been paranoid for months, certain that my clan was the next on the hitlist due to the sheer animosity we faced as Kirigakure refugees, and I’d only just returned to a state of normalcy.  
  
My heart suddenly flew out to Sasuke. I’d always felt really bad for him, sympathizing with his situation since my clan had to suffer through a lot of unjustified social discrimination, too. I had been decent enough friends with him prior to the Massacre. We weren’t terribly close, definitely not, but we got along, and Sasuke seemed to open up to me better than most.  
  
Ever since the Massacre, it felt like I’d become a ghost to him, and my spite over this made me ignore him, too.  
  
I chewed my lip, wishing that I’d been able to remember everything earlier. Surely there had to be _something_ , ANYTHING I could have done to save the Uchiha.  
  
Guilt settled deep within me even as I realized it was pointless feeling guilty for not being able to save them when I didn’t even know at the time that they were in such danger. I took a deep breath and forced it down, shoving it away for now.  
  
As for Naruto…  
  
I paused and blinked. Wait. Naru _to_?  
  
The blonde troublemaker I knew was not an Uzumaki _Naruto_ , but an Uzumaki _Naruko_. A loudmouthed, brat of a prankster who was annoyingly cute and constantly spouting off about how _SHE—_ not HE—was going to become Hokage. She had a pendant for wearing orange, and had twin, bushy pigtails.  
  
…Huh. So there was at least one other change to this world other than my Clan’s existence.  
  
…I wondered what else was different than the Memories.  
  
I wondered what I could _change_.  
  
I pursed my lips and started planning.  
  


~o~

  
One Uzumaki Naruko sat alone in the park during lunch, hugging her knees to her chest. For once in her life, it wasn’t because she was lonely. It was because she was lost in thought. And it was a line of thought that she hadn’t expected to be going down. Namely, that the kid from Mist was acting _hella_ weird lately, ever since he came back from his medical break from school.  
  
He was _nice_ to her.  
  
Like, _what_?  
  
To be fair, she supposed, looking back on things, he’d never been particularly mean to her. They just hadn’t really interacted much. He was a pretty quiet kid, usually either studying something in class or passed out, asleep. He was a lot Shikamaru in that aspect. They both liked taking naps. He WAS very serious about his schoolwork other than that, though, which Naruko personally found to be a weird juxtaposition (not that she’d have known that word to describe it with). He was bright and lazy, like Shikamaru, and perhaps because of their shared (and, in her opinion, boring) qualities, sometimes she saw the two playing shogi together in recess.  
  
Shikamaru always won, though.  
  
All that said, since coming back three days ago, Ren never slept in class, even if he looked downright exhausted by the end of the day. Instead, he kept a thermos of coffee with him that he drank from. He participated in class a lot more, and worked a LOT harder, especially in Taijutsu, and in Chakra Theory and Application.  
  
That was Weird Trait Number One.  
  
Weird Trait Number Two was that he began choosing to sit beside Naruko, and openly chatted with her in downtime. He even volunteered to be her partner on a group project yesterday, which literally _nobody_ had ever done before. He’d even smuggled chips in and offered them to her! Stunned, she’d asked why, and he’d just shrugged, saying, “You looked hungry. Do you want them or not? Because I’ll definitely eat them if you don’t want them.”  
  
She’d quickly accepted them, stomach growling at the thought of chips.  
  
Weird Trait Number Three was that he was friendly with Sasuke again. Or, trying to, anyway.  
  
Sasuke just kind of… purposefully ignored him. Or maybe begrudgingly accepted his existence and the fact that it didn’t seem like he was going anywhere anytime soon. It was difficult to tell with the Bastard.  
  
She furrowed her brow, eyes closing in thought as she tried to figure out what the heckin’ heck was going on. She hummed, shifting about. What had happened? What had he even gone to the hospital for? She didn’t know, but damn did she want to.  
  
(And… was he being nice to her because he wanted to be her—? She stopped that train before it arrived at its destination and gave her too much hope.)  
  
Grass rustled beside her, and Naruko jumped, gaping up at the navy-haired boy who sat down beside her, bento in hand. His turquoise eyes shone with hunger as he removed the lid, and the mouth-watering aroma of sushi, soy sauce, and egg rolls filtered out. As he took out his chopsticks and was about to eat, he glanced at her, blinking. Then he glanced back at his bento. Now back to her. Now back to his bento.  
  
“…Do you want some sushi?” he offered, picking up a roll with his chopsticks and moving it towards her.  
  
Her brain stalled for a few seconds.  
  
“…Eh?”  
  
“Do you want some sushi?” he repeated, waving the roll for emphasis. Then his eyebrows lifted. “Oh, wait, do you not like sushi? I have an egg roll, too, if you want that instead.”  
  
Reeling, she had to blink several times to make sure she was seeing everything properly. Yep. The sushi still hung between his chopsticks, proffered to her.  
  
“What the hell!?” Naruko barked suddenly, brain defaulting to the only thing it knew in situations she wasn’t used to—being loud. The rest of the kids nearby paused and looked at them in confusion. “You’re so WEIRD lately! Why are you offering me sushi!? Why are you offering me an egg roll!? I don’t _understand_!”  
  
Ren’s mouth opened slowly, then shut. He looked absolutely flummoxed. “…Because you didn’t seem to have any lunch and that’s just the nice thing to do?”  
  
Naruko blinked once. Twice.  
  
Her stomach growled.  
  
“…Sushi’s okay,” she murmured in a small voice, flushing deeply, and Ren smiled as she sat down. He placed it in her hand, and she carefully gripped it with her fingers before dipping it in some soy sauce. Sensing that a fight had not occurred, the other kids all returned their attention whatever it was they’d been doing. Then Naruto opened her mouth and brought her acquired sushi up—Fearful for a moment that he’d snatch it back when she wasn’t paying attention, she snapped her mouth shut and glanced at him as he watched her. He blinked brow furrowing in confusion, and she studied him for a moment before, with exceedingly uncharacteristic shyness, slipping the sushi roll between her lips and chewing.  
  
She paused, silent as the flavors filled her mouth. She slowly chewed, rolling the rice across her tongue and letting the soy sauce linger.  
  
Maybe she took too long, because Ren tensed a little. “I-Is it not good?” he offered, frowning. “I have other flavors if you—”  
  
She shook her head, still in utter disbelief at everything happening to her. “It was good,” she murmured quietly.  
  
Relief flooded the Kawase Clan heir’s face, and he smiled widely. “That was my mother’s cooking,” he explained, nodding. “It is really good, isn’t it?”  
  
Savoring the taste of sushi that still remained, she nodded, suddenly realizing a tear had rolled down her cheek. Why? Was she crying over a single piece of sushi? It didn’t make sense. None of this made sense.  
  
(Later, Naruko, staring at the ceiling of her lonesome apartment and thinking back on the day’s events, would realize it was because she’d never known what it was like to enjoy a mother’s cooking before.)  
  
“It was,” she murmured, wiping the tear. “It was really good. It… It was the best sushi I’ve ever had.”  
  
He smiled widely. “That’s sweet of you. You’re a good friend, Naruko.”  
  
From that day on, Naruko never went without lunch again, because Ren, her first friend, always made sure she had some.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews are always appreciated! Also, this story is cross-posted on Spacebattles and FFN.


	3. A Game of Survival

Yamanaka Ino liked to think that she understood her classmates pretty well. Her Clan’s expertise was over the mind, after all. No one knew the human mind quite as well as a Yamanaka. She had most of her classmates pegged from the start, but lately some of her peers seemed to be slipping away from the boxes she’d placed them in. Hinata answered questions in class of her own volition more and slowly crawled out of her shell, inch by inch; Naruko didn’t seem quite as short as she used to be and was… well, not _calm_ , but calm _er_ lately; and even Kiba didn’t annoy her as much as he usually did.  
  
And it all seemed to center around one Kawase Ren, who, ever since the rumored concussion that he’d suffered, had become far more of a social bee than he’d been.  
  
She frowned, staring at the back of his head and studying him. What had changed? Why did he suddenly care so much about making friends with everyone around him, or at least the Clan heirs and a few others, when previously he’d mostly kept to himself? She was _dying_ to know.  
  
“Alright, alright, quiet down, everyone,” Iruka-sensei said as he walked through the door, smiling at his students. He was easily Ino’s favorite teacher of all the instructors they had. It was clear that he absolutely _loved_ doing what he did, and truly wanted the best for every student. The class quieted down, and even Naruko stopped chatting with Ren to glance up at him. “To check and make sure that everyone’s settled in for homeroom today, let’s get a head count…”  
  
Ino’s eyes, as they often did these days, glanced to the right and fell on Ren’s face.  
  
It was odd. He looked much older than eight these days, at least, from his eyes. He acted older, too, although he still felt like a kid. It was really strange, and she’d noticed this ever since his medical leave.  
  
“Yamanaka Ino,” Ikura-sensei called out, drawing her attention away.  
  
“Present,” she said with a beatific smile.  
  
The Jounin finished up with the head count, and they all made sure that they had the appropriate supplies. The usage of weapons, taijutsu, Academy-level genjutsu, sealing jutsu, and the three Academy Jutsu only were going to be allowed; no elemental Jutsu or clan Jutsu. Only the Substitution, Transformation, and Clone Jutsu were permitted. The type of survival game, Iruka-sensei explained, was a Capture-the-Flag scenario. The class would be split into two “Villages,” with the “Kages” of each “Village” being the team captain. Their teacher selected each Kage himself.  
  
“Alright,” Iruka-sensei decided, “Uchiha Sasuke is the Kage of the Akakagure*, and Nara Shikamaru is the Kage of the Aoikagure**. Kages, please select the shinobi you will be leading. And everyone, remember—no serious injuries. Knocking out opponents is fine, as long as it’s not too hard of a hit.”  
  
Ino’s eyes rose. Shikamaru as Kage for the game; this would be interesting.  
  
Shikamaru scooped up Ino and Chouji, naturally, since they had the best teamwork of just about any in the class. It was almost a shame; she could have been on Sasuke’s team, and yet now she was forced in opposition to him! It was like a romantic tragedy! Focusing away from that, Sasuke had selected Kiba, Hinata, and surprisingly, Ami (with a long-suffering look; he’d probably only done it due to the girl’s exceptional taijutsu ability and agility). Shikamaru then took Ren and Sasuke in turn chose Sakura.  
  
Ino frowned deeply. How was _that_ fair? Though she supposed that Sakura, having already mastered the Academy Jutsu thanks to her extraordinary chakra control, WAS a good choice for a teammate. She could be a massive support boon.  
  
The remaining class members were divvied up, with Shino, the second-to-last one left, being chosen by Sasuke and Naruko being, as usual, the final choice. She went to Shikamaru, and cheered as she wrapped Ren in a hug. The kid blushed a little, smiling and giving a squeeze back.  
  
Studying the Red ‘Village’ after they reached the wooded training grounds where the game would commence, Shikamaru sighed and rubbed the side of his head. “Man, this is troublesome,” he muttered. “They’ve got really strong overall taijutsu power. We only really have one powerhouse.”  
  
Said powerhouse hummed as he munched on some chips.  
  
“Well, Shikamaru, you’re the commander,” Ren said, grinning despite the strength of the other team. “And your strategic skills are second to none in our class. If anyone can lead us to victory, it’ll be you.”  
  
“You put way too much faith in me,” Shikamaru grumbled. “Troublesome.” He sighed and gathered them together in a group. “Alright, listen up. Who here is good with the Academy Jutsus? Ino, Chouji, I already know your abilities, but I’m not certain on everyone else’s.”  
  
Ino raised her hand. “I’m pretty good at the Substitution and Transformation.”  
  
“I’m decent enough with the Clone Jutsu,” one of the civilian kids with stringy brown hair—Ino thought his name was Konda—offered.  
  
“I’m only good at Transformation,” Ren declared, “but I have high chakra sensitivity and can sense where people are hiding. I’m better with weapons and marksmanship than I am at the Academy Jutsus.”  
  
“I suck at all three Academy Jutsus, but I’m really unpredictable and good at pranking,” Naruko offered, hand raised up in the air. “I’m great at setting up traps! And I know sealing, too, because a few years ago, Hokage-sama gave me some of my mother’s notes. Apparently she was, like, _really_ good at sealing, and he said that I reminded him of her so much that he thought I might do well with it! It was really, really weird and hard at first, but I can finally use some seals! There’s this one seal I have that I think would be _perfect_!”  
  
That piqued Shikamaru’s interest. “You can use sealing?” He blinked a few times, and everyone stared at Naruko. “…Huh. Okay, that’s unexpected.”  
  
Ren stared at her, blinking dumbly. “...How can you be so bad at the Academy Jutsus if you can use _sealing_?”  
  
Naruko pouted.  
  
The others in the team all gave their various strengths and weaknesses, and Shikamaru hummed as he mulled it over. His arms crossed over his chest and he tapped his foot. Chouji watched him, more chips crunching between his teeth as he chewed. “Shikamaru, I believe in you,” he said after a few minutes, smiling, and the boy paused, glancing up at the Akimichi.  
  
He smirked. “Thanks, Chouji. I think I have a plan. Alright, everyone listen up.” All eyes fell on Shikamaru and they huddled in close, just in case anyone was watching and trying to eavesdrop. “Now listen up. First of all, since most of us are weak when it comes to taijutsu except Chouji, Ren, and Ino, avoid direct engagement. Especially avoid aerial combat with Sasuke; you’ll probably get destroyed. Shino, Ren, you’ll be scouts, but Ren, switch to mid-range fighting if need be. What we’ll do if we have to directly fight them is…”  
  
Soon after Shikamaru finished explaining the plan, a gong rose out over the forested training ground, and it was time to begin.  
  
Everyone rushed out into the trees except for Chouji, who stood as the group’s last line of defense; a huge, impenetrable wall.  
  
“Fan out!” Shikamaru ordered. “To your places, everyone! Get with your partners!”  
  
Ino was stuck tailing alongside Naruko so that she could have someone to help her set up traps. Nobody except Chouji and Ren, the two in the group who were most skilled at hand-to-hand, were allowed to go out on their own. Naruko grinned and handed Ino a scroll, which she took with extreme caution. “This one’ll shoot out some REALLY rancid gas that makes your eyes water,” Naruko explained. “I set it up to activate if someone stands underneath it, so place it on a tree branch or something.”  
  
Ino, scandalized at the thought of such horrible smells lingering on her beautiful body, gaped at the other blonde. “And just what were you planning on using this for?”  
  
Naruko sheepishly rubbed the back of her head. “…Pranking that annoying Mizuki-sensei?” she said with an awkward chuckle.  
  
Ah, that made sense. Whenever the class had the misfortune of having him teach a class alongside Iruka, or fill in for Iruka when he fell ill, Mizuki always seemed to pick on Naruto the worst. He was generally disliked by almost all the kids, though, due to the fact that he played favorites HARD. Ino found that she couldn’t really fault the other girl for that.  
  
“…Well, if you make more of them, just keep them away from anywhere I might go,” she sniffed, climbing up a tree, reaching out, and pasting the scroll onto the bottom of a tree branch. She smoothed it out with her hand so that it wouldn’t have too many wrinkles on it, then kicked off the tree and stuck a three-point landing.  
  
Beaming at the perceived approval, Naruko gave a big thumbs-up. Ino rolled her eyes, but maybe smirked. Just a little.  
  
They continued skirting around the forest, setting up traps and generally trying to avoid people. Occasionally, they heard startled yells from the other team, and various noises of mass confusion, as some of their traps successfully got set off. At last, they finished their given task, ten minutes into the game. It lasted about an hour, so they could go back up anyone who needed it in the forty minutes remaining.  
  
“Let’s go help Ren!” Naruko spoke up. “I think I saw Sasuke sneaking over towards the big tree Shikamaru had him hide in.”  
  
Ino raised a brow. “He’s not _hiding_. He’s keeping a tactical view of the battlefield and using his sensory and marksmanship to provide long-range backup to anyone who needs it.”  
  
“Same thing!” Naruko stuck her tongue out, and Ino resisted the urge to palm her face.  
  
“It really is not the—” She shook her head, marching off towards the tree in question. It was the largest tree in the training field, probably because of the fact that it was the only tree in a clearing next to a stream that cut through. “You know what, I’m not even going to try. Let’s just… Let’s just go.”  
  
Naruko canted her head, blinking. “Eh? Uh… okay, then, I guess?” She trotted along behind Ino like a puppy. The taller blonde couldn’t help but think it was kind of cute. She quickly punched the part of her that thought that and kept going like nothing was happening inside her head. Due to being a Yamanaka, she had gotten quite skilled at pretending that.  
  
The sounds of fighting rose up as they reached the clearing with the lone tree, and as they emerged from the trees, Ino frowned. Ren was locked in combat with Sasuke, eyes wild as he tried to find any ground to gain on the more gifted martial artist. He’d been backed up toward the river, and did NOT look pleased with this fact, if his increasingly erratic and desperate movements were anything to go by. Everyone knew about his phobia, and Sasuke had apparently decided to try and use it to his advantage.  
  
Ino hesitated, not sure who she wanted to win; her teammate, or the ultimate crush Sasuke-kun.  
  
Ren trembled horribly as his foot almost went into the water; while he currently succeeded in deflecting attacks, he lost ground fast and his defenses grew steadily weaker.  
  
She sighed despondently, cursing the fact that she was such a good person, and glanced at Naruko. “Please don’t announce our presence,” she told her as the girl opened her mouth. The shorter of the two quickly snapped her mouth shut. “Alright, I’m going to transform into a shuriken. Throw me at Sasuke in the shadow of another shuriken.”  
  
“Uh, right!” Naruko agreed with a salute. Ino’s hands flashed through the hand seals required and disappeared in a puff of smoke, a shuriken dropping into Naruko’s hand in her place. From her bag, the loudest of her classmates withdrew another shuriken and slipped it atop shuriken-Ino, and threw them both with… Well, it was okay accuracy. They at least whizzed close by Sasuke, even if they didn’t hit.  
  
As she flew past Sasuke in the shadow of the other shuriken, Sasuke’s head whirled around to glance at Naruko, who smirked.  
  
“Gotcha, Bastard!” she barked with a look on her face not terribly dissimilar to the one Kiba often had.  
  
“You didn’t even hit—” Sasuke started to say, only to be cut off as a foot connected with his side and knocked him a few feet away. He landed on his stomach and rolled, picking himself up off the ground. The startled look on his face told Ino he had NOT been expecting her kick. She landed smoothly out of her canceled transformation and proceeding attack, smiling apologetically.  
  
“Sorry, Sasuke-kun~” she said in a sing-song voice. “I wouldn’t have hit you if this wasn’t for a grade~!”  
  
Sasuke’s eye twitched. Ren immediately scooted as far away from the water as he possibly could, and glanced at Ino gratefully. “Thank you _so much_ ,” he said with unbridled sincerity.  
  
Ino studied him for a moment, then huffed and glanced back towards Sasuke. “It is _so unfair_ that you can look that cute even when you’re terrified out of your mind, and you’re a guy. It is _unfair_ how well that kimono fits you without you even trying, and even after a taijutsu fight with the best in our grade.”  
  
“I-I AM NOT TERRIFIED OUT OF MY MIND!” Ren protested, voice breaking a little.  
  
Ino would have snarked back, but Sasuke was rushing towards her. She dodged a punch and deflected a roundhouse kick. Ren swallowed, glancing very nervously at the water, before leaping back into the fray. Naruko, not one to be left out, hollered out a battle cry and dashed forward, taking out a kunai to make it a three-on-one.  
  
Sasuke’s annoyance was palpable by now as he ducked and weaved through all their attacks.  
  
Ino’s hope that they could defeat Sasuke rose as his dodges got slower and his blocks weaker. Because of this, she maybe overextended a punch a little too much as she saw what looked like a potential opening that arose as he deflected an uppercut Ren threw out.  
  
Then a fist hit her in the head hard and she went out cold.  
  
When she came to, Naruko and Ren were groaning and sitting up on the grass, rubbing bumps on their heads, and Sasuke was no where in the vicinity.  
  
“It’s unfair how good he is,” Naruko complained, throwing her hands up in the air. “I mean, what the hell!? The three of us couldn’t beat him!?”  
  
“He’s put in a hell of a lot more training than either of us have,” Ren muttered, nursing the bump on his head tenderly. “But yeah, what the _fuck_.”  
  
“It’s not fair… It’s really not fair, dammit…” Naruko sounded really dejected. “I want to become Hokage, but… he’s stronger than all three of us combined.”  
  
Neither of them had seemed to notice that Ino was awake and listening in.  
  
Ren glanced at the short blonde. “Well, we’re still only kids, Naruko. Work your butt off, and I’m sure you can beat him. But you gotta pay attention in class, you hear me?” He frowned and poked her nose, drawing a squawk from her.  
  
“Oi! Until recently, you slept in class practically every day!”  
  
“That’s because I have nightmares of my death—!” he started to huff out in retort, only to freeze so fast Ino barely recognized it, and correct himself. “…Dead clan, dummy.”  
  
Her brows furrowed. Death? What? Had she heard that correctly? But he’d only gotten a concussion. How could he have _died_? If he’d died, he shouldn’t even _be_ here! Equal parts curiosity and confusion flooded her.  
  
Naruko was quiet for a while. “Do you really think I can become Hokage?” she asked in a voice more nervous than Ino had ever heard before.  
  
Ren’s response came with zero hesitance. “I _promise_ you that you can. I _know_ you will. And I’ll do whatever it takes to help you get there.” His words carried with them one-hundred-percent certainty. Not just the kind of certainty that you would have from holding faith, but the kind of certainty that whispered he knew more than he was letting on. Ino’s ears perked up and she listened more intently.  
  
“How can you be so sure?” Naruko asked softly, though her voice sounded like it was regaining her confidence.  
  
“Because I can see the future~” Ren said in a sing-song voice, and Naruko stuck her tongue out.  
  
“ _Reeeeeeeen_! I’m serious!”  
  
Ren didn’t respond, just sat back and laughed, grinning. When he was done, his gaze shifted over to the stream beside them. He swallowed and then got to his feet. “Well, now that Ino’s awake, let’s all go to Iruka-sensei. We got knocked out, after all, so we’re out of the competition.”  
  
Startled, Ino sat up with wide eyes. She pouted at Ren. “How did you know I was awake?” she grumbled.  
  
Ren grinned cheekily. “I’m a natural-born sensor, remember? I felt the shift in your chakra flow.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah,” Ino muttered. And here she thought she’d be sneaky and learn something about him. But there was no way that he could actually see the future. There was no way he had _actually_ died once. And so now she’d been dropped back to square one. What had caused him to change so much after he came back from the hospital? Annoyed with herself that she’d been unable to figure it out, she glanced at Ren. “Before we go, can you wait here with me?” she requested. “I want to talk to you. Naruko, you just go on ahead.”  
  
“What?” Naruko blinked. “Awwww, come on!” But she walked off anyway, hands stuffed in her pockets and grumbling under her breath.  
  
Confused, Ren’s eyes fell on Ino. “Uh… what is it you wanted to talk about?” he said with a head tilt.  
  
“Okay, what the heck is going on with you?” Ino, unable to hold back anymore, burst out. “You’re so _different_ lately! You’ve never been this sociable and even your whole way of speaking is different! You’re like an entirely different person!” A thought crossed her mind and she tensed, taking out a kunai and falling into a defensive stance. “You’re not an infiltrator, are you!? Did you kill the real Ren and try to take his place to gain access to secrets about how the Academy teaches!? Bad move when you have a Yamanaka in his class!”  
  
Turquoise eyes widening, Ren took a step back and quickly waved his hands, shaking his head in slight panic. “Whoa, whoa, o-okay, put the kunai away, please! I’m not an infiltrator. It’s really me. I’m still Ren, okay?”  
  
Ino, still studying him with a frown, lowered the kunai a tad. The infiltrator theory definitely would explain a lot, but… “And how can you prove it to me?”  
  
Ren’s mouth opened and closed. “…Uhh…”  
  
Ino smirked. “Let me look inside your head. That’ll prove it.”  
  
The cute boy visibly tensed at the demand, eyes darting from side to side as if looking for an escape. “I-Is there any other way I can convince you?” he asked hurriedly. “I don’t think I’ve talked with you very much, so there’s not really any kind of memory only the two of us would know—”  
  
What in the world? What was he so nervous about? Was he really an infiltrator after all? Ino’s eyes narrowed and her kunai hand lifted back to its previous position. Her whole body tensed. “Let me in your mind or I’ll take you to Iruka-sensei and have him give you to T&I.”  
  
Ren swallowed. “…Shit,” he muttered to himself, “O-Okay.”  
  
Ino relaxed and put the kunai away. Her hands flew through the seals for her clan’s kekkei genkai. “Mind-Body Jutsu.”  
  
 _Thousands of male Narukos attacking Mizuki-sensei. A pale-faced man whose body came out of a snake biting Sasuke-kun on the neck. Male Naruko and Hinata happily married, with two cute kids. Ino’s father dying in a war. Everyone enveloped in a humongous genjutsu. An orange-haired man leading a group to sack Konoha. Lord Third, sacrificing himself to try and end the life of the pale-faced man. A black man from Cloud who spoke in rhymes. Male Naruko and Sasuke-kun locked in all-out battle on a waterfall, a cruel, horrible look on Sasuke-kun’s face as he launched a lightning-enshrouded hand straight at his opponent’s chest. A world completely unlike Ino’s own. A house on the hill. A raft flowing along whitewater rapids, hitting a particularly hard rapid and sending a young man aboard the raft into the air, sinking deep into the river. Drowning—  
  
“Shit.”  
  
Eyes wide, Ino looked over to see Ren, a troubled frown on his face.  
  
“I’d been trying not to let you see all that. Wish I’d been born a Yamanaka…” He ran a hand through his navy hair, wincing._  
  
The Jutsu canceled, and Ino was left staring open-mouthed at Ren.  
  
How was one supposed to react when you accidentally learned that a member of your class was actually a reincarnated fan of a show where you were a side character? Not knowing the answer to this herself, she just stood stock-still for several long minutes.  
  
“Um…” Ren gulped and fumbled his fingers together. “S-So, listen…”  
  
Not really knowing what else to do, Ino turned tail and ran, bolting into the forest and away from Ren.  
  
Alone in the clearing, Ren let out a shaky breath. “…I _really_ hope she didn’t see any of the hentai in my memories.”  
  
~o~  
  
*Hidden Red Village  
**Hidden Blue Village


	4. Necessary Conversations

When Ino darted away from me looking like she’d seen a ghost—which, I supposed, wasn’t _too_ far from the truth—I panicked. If she told anyone about what I knew…! Thoughts of Danzo hearing about it, capturing me, and torturing me for information, then slaughtering me like a pig in order to eliminate me as a threat made me shiver. The man was incredibly hazardous to my health; perhaps moreso than any other potential threat in Konoha. The only man I feared as much as Danzo at the moment was Orochimaru, for the exact same reasons.  
  
I had to stop her before she let anyone know anything.  
  
Sending chakra into my legs to help with faster running, I bolted after her, heading to the edge of the training ground where Iruka-sensei and all of my ‘captured’ or otherwise defeated classmates would wait for me. I dodged around trees, leapt over bushes, and after a few minutes, caught up with Ino.  
  
“Oi!” I called out, and she flinched, looking over her shoulder at me with wide eyes. “Ino, wait! Please! We need to talk before you go to anyone, _especially_ adults, please!”  
  
Ino hesitated, her feet slowing down, and then she came to a stop, fully turning towards me. A bead of nervous sweat rolled down her forehead.  
  
“A-All of that, all of that was… real?” she whispered, voice cracking, as I came to a stop in front of her, panting. “You’re really reincarnated? A-And… Naruko has the _Nine-Tails_ inside of her!? That’s why everyone hates her!?”  
  
Taking a deep breath, I nodded, biting my lip. “Y-Yeah. She does. I confirmed it myself after applying my sensory abilities to her. She has waaaaaaay too much chakra for a normal kid, even a kid who’s a shinobi-in-training.”  
  
“A-And Konoha is going to get—” She trailed off, paling horribly. “M-Madara… Why shouldn’t we warn anyone, Ren!? _Uchiha Madara is_ —”  
  
I cut her off with a stern glare. “Do you _want_ Danzo watching your every move, waiting for the chance to torture you for as much information as you can possibly give him?”  
  
Ino froze and paled, shaking her head rapidly. “O-Oh,” she said in a very small voice, eyes landing on the floor. Then, looking up at me with wide eyes, she asked, “Ren, how have you managed to be so normal and calm knowing what’s going to happen to us within the next, like, ten years? I’d be freaking out. I… _a-am_ freaking out. Ren, my _father_ is going to _die_ in the war!” A horrible sob escaped her as though fully understanding this for the first time. “My future _sensei_ is going to die!”  
  
Ah. Sympathetically, I gave her a solemn nod. “And I’m going to change it,” I assured. “I promise I’ll change it. But I need this to be secret, okay? If we’re going to succeed in making a better future for everyone, we need as few people to know about this as possible, and only the most trustworthy. The more people know, the greater the risk of our knowledge getting out to the wrong people.”  
  
Ino swallowed, but bit her lip. “Okay,” she said in soft agreement. “I won’t tell anyone.”  
  
Relief flooded through me. “Thank you,” I said sincerely. And I had to admit, I felt a little better now that I wasn’t alone in my knowledge. When I first realized what I knew, I’d _panicked_. Honestly, no matter how much I pretended, I hadn’t been able to relax. Now it felt like a huge weight had lifted off my shoulders.  
  
Quieting down, we both headed off to Iruka together.  
  
“So are you…” Ino spoke up awkwardly as we made our way through the forest. “Are you a man or a kid? I didn’t see very much of your old life, but I saw some. You were in your twenties when you…” She rubbed the back of her head, clearly feeling strange saying this. “When you died, right?”  
  
That question gave me some pause. I frowned, thinking about that. “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I didn’t even remember anything, or at least _consciously_ remember anything, until just recently. So I still _feel_ like a kid, mentally. So I guess I’m a kid? But I also had my past life…” I trailed off, furrowing my brow.  
  
“Well, if you feel like you’re a kid, then I’ll say you’re a kid,” she said with a tentative smile. “At least, until you decide otherwise. Plus in your mindscape, you were a kid, so… I’m gonna go with that.”  
  
I blinked, then shrugged and smiled at her. “You’re taking this better than I thought you would, all things considered.”  
  
“I’m really not,” she deadpanned. “Give me maybe two weeks, then I’ll feel normal again.”  
  
“That’s fair.” Amused, a laugh left my lips as we exited the training field and found the others. Shino was already defeated, nursing some wounds that looked like they’d been created by some of the kunai Naruko had put in trap seals. Ami had been defeated, too, and looked royally pissed off at this fact by the glare she leveled into the forest and the way her teeth ground together. Hinata had been captured and sat in a curled up ball, hands hugging her legs sadly.  
  
Poor Hinata.  
  
On my team, only Naruko, Ino, and I had been defeated, and as such, we were the only ones present alongside Iruka-sensei.  
  
The game didn’t last much longer before Iruka-sensei, watching the chaos unfold in a tall tree, blew a whistle and called it. The rest of the class who had still survived up to this point, in various states of ruggedness—with Sasuke’s team looking surprisingly worse for the wear—returned to us, and Iruka nodded.  
  
“Shikamaru’s team takes the victory,” Iruka announced. “Their strategy of using Transformation Jutsu to hide people as weapons, only engaging in direct combat when opponents were alone and only fighting in pairs, getting opponents on their own to take down, and Naruko’s traps were what drove the team to take the win. Sasuke, your team was very skilled at fighting and could’ve overpowered most members of Shikamaru’s team in almost any individual battle, but your strategy and skills alone were not a match for Shikamaru’s planning.”  
  
“Tch,” Sasuke grumbled, folding his arms and looking away. “I know that already.” He held his arm tenderly and it hung by his side oddly; I wondered if he’d encountered Chouji.  
  
“HA!” Naruko burst out, grinning and pointing at Sasuke. “WE BEAT YOU, BASTARD!”  
  
Sasuke stared flatly at her. “You _lost_ to me.”  
  
The blonde deflated a little, but quickly laughed again. “But our team kicked you guys’ ass, and that’s the only thing that matters!” she retorted, smirking.  
  
Sasuke now looked as annoyed as Ami.  
  
I poked Naruko in the forehead. “Stop antagonizing Sasuke,” I said with a raised eyebrow. “It’s not very nice, and people don’t like to be reminded of their failures.” I knew that from personal experience. “Hokages don’t get people down when there’s no reason to, do they?”  
  
“I guess not…” Naruko, now looking rather ashamed, mumbled.  
  
“Wow, Ren knows exactly how to handle her,” Sakura stage-whispered to Ino, mildly impressed.  
  
Ami snorted. “Idiots bond with idiots. They’re a perfect match.”  
  
“Alright, enough, everyone,” Iruka-sensei told us, turning and heading back to the Academy. “Come along, we still have the rest of our scheduled classes.” Groans rose up, most noticeably from Shikamaru, but we all followed him back to the Academy anyway.  
  


~o~

  
When I got home that day, it was unexpectedly quiet. No random flying Fathers tackled me out of nowhere as I walked the path around Lake Tomoe to our nice brick house. I hummed, brows furrowed. Actually, come to think of it, ever since my near-fatal accident, Father had been more solemn. He’d been more careful around me, and it felt weird. I liked him better when he was boisterous and energetic. It somehow didn’t feel right for him to be all quiet and thoughtful.  
  
Mother, as normal, sat out on the water, meditating and practicing our clan kekkei genkai. I watched as ripples in the water emanated out from her in perfect, evenly spaced intervals, growing steadily larger in size. It was an advanced technique that was supposed to give us better control over the manipulation of our chakra.  
  
The two types of chakra required for our kekkei genkai were Water chakra and Lightning chakra. With Water chakra in the left hand and Lightning in the right, our ancestors had discovered that it was possible to create a sort of electromagnetism that affected the liquid in our bodies. Thusly, Fluid Release, the ability to manipulate our body fluids at will with the flow of our chakra, and by extension any liquids our body fluids came into contact with, was born.  
  
…Well, I supposed technically we were able to use it with ALL liquids, not just the ones our body fluids came into contact with, but our body fluids, which through meditation we constantly soaked in our chakra, could be controlled far easier than any other liquids, and were more powerful when used as attacks and defenses.  
  
In any case, rambling aside, of all the things I expected to see after opening the door to our house, Father looking at a picture book on the couch was not one of them. He didn’t look up as I entered.  
  
I didn’t even know we _had_ picture books. My parents weren’t terribly sentimental.  
  
“Dad?” I said softly as I walked into the living room towards him. His chakra felt… sad. “Are you okay?” My head peeked around his arm (I was too small to see over his shoulders even while he was sitting down) and frowned when I saw one of the photos he was looking at. His thumb ran over its edges.  
  
The photo had two adults, male and female. The man, who I recognized from his hair color and eye color to be my biological father, and the woman, who must have been my biological mother from the shape of her nose and the way my bio-Father had his arm wrapped around her shoulders and was kissing her on the cheek, held a very girlish young boy in her arms like he was an angel. My eyes stung a little. That boy had to be me. But to my surprise, an older boy, about five years older than Baby Ren, stood behind them, frowning out from behind Dad’s leg. He didn’t look shy, exactly, but more bored and just _done_ with shit, like he would rather be anywhere else. A necklace hung off his neck, a wood star with the kanji for “water” in the middle written in silver plating. He had green hair and sharp eyes.  
  
“Who’s the kid?” I found myself asking. “I had a brother?” I’d had no idea.  
  
Father let out an amused but weak chuckle. “No,” he said, lifting up a hand to ruffle my hair. He looked far older than his usual, annoyingly youthful appearance for a forty-year-old man. “You had a _sister_.” My eyebrows shot up in disbelief at that, and I studied the picture closely.  
  
“No way,” I deadpanned, staring at Father. “That’s a guy.”  
  
A louder, stronger chuckle escaped him now. “It’s strange,” Father mused, shaking his head. “You always looked like a girl despite being a boy, and your sister always looked like a boy despite being a girl. Mother used to joke that Tomoe’s and Dansui’s DNA must have been drunk.”  
  
My eyes fell back on the photo, curiosity brimming. “What was her name?” I asked quietly. “My sister?”  
  
“Nagisa.”  
  
Nagisa… Kawase Nagisa. A sister I’d never even known I’d had until now. My heart ached; I’d always wanted to have a sibling. In my past life, I _had_ had an older sibling; an older sister just like Nagisa would have been. “And she was killed during our flee from Kirigakure, like Mother and Father?” I paused and amended. “My biological ones?”  
  
“Indeed,” he said quietly. “She was captured by the Kiri nin chasing after us. Tomoe and Dansui… they left you in my arms and told me to make sure you were safe. Then they leaped into battle, as much to save Nagisa as to buy us time. If it wasn’t for their bravery, our whole clan would have been wiped out.”  
  
Oh.  
  
Not really knowing what to say to that, I bit my lip and squirmed, before at last going over to sit next to him on the couch and hug him.  
  
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.  
  
Strong hands wrapped around my tiny body. “It’s okay, Ren,” Father whispered back, a hand brushing through my silky hair. “It wasn’t your fault they died. It wasn’t Nagisa’s, either.”  
  
We quieted down, both looking at the picture for several moments. Then I jumped when Father suddenly snapped the book shut, and grinned at me. “It’s been a while since we trained together last, Ren,” he said with a grin. “Want to work on your ability to control water and lightning chakra separately? I know you have the most trouble with the water control part.”  
  
A shiver ran down my spine at the mention of water, but I nodded, smiling. “Sure, Father. I…” I frowned, thinking about Nagisa, the sister I never got to know, and how distraught Ino had been upon realizing that her Father was a dead man walking; about how earlier today, Sasuke had put me on the defensive without even breaking a sweat, and defeated all THREE of us without much difficulty. “I want to protect the people I care about. I need to get stronger.”  
  
Father smiled back proudly, getting up and stretching with a groan. He then carefully placed the book on the couch. “Come on, then. Don’t worry. I won’t make you meditate near water again.”  
  


~o~

  
_“Ichi. Ni. San.”_  
  
Footsteps echoed across the dark room. Stone walls encompassed the dank, stale air, broken only by the aforementioned footsteps, the ruffle of moving clothing, and the striking of a fist against rock.  
  
 _“Yon. Go. Roku.”_  
  
“Still at it, dear?” an amused chuckle, as dark as the cave around them, echoed. A pale faced man walked into the room, smirking at the person in front of him. His eyes were disgusting, snakelike slits, and he wore a cruel smirk as he studied his student. Such an interesting specimen… Truly, one of his proudest works. “That wall didn’t do anything to you, you know.” He couldn’t help it; he still had some snark left in him. Seems Jiraiya’s influence couldn’t quite be eliminated even after years of VERY purposeful self-isolation from the aggravating idiot.  
  
Blood dripped from the youth’s fists, flowing in small streams from the cracked knuckles of her fists. Even as he watched, however, the red liquid started flowing back up and re-entered the wound.  
  
“Don’t bother quipping,” a quiet, almost dead voice rang out. “It doesn’t suit you, and you’re not very good at it.”  
  
“So young, but so sassy,” he said, smirking wider. “You really ought to learn to respect your superiors more. Especially when I’m giving you the strength you so desperately crave, after all.”  
  
Turquoise eyes turned on him, glaring sharply. “Shut up. I don’t care. Just give me what I need. That’s all, Lord Orochimaru.”  
  
“Hai, hai.” Raising an eyebrow, he chuckled. “I’ll give you the strength to defeat those who you seek to. But you still need to train your body more.”  
  
“And did you think I was bruising my fists against this wall for _fun_?”  
  
Orochimaru smirked and nodded curtly. “I was just checking up on my prodigy. It’s good to see the speed of your strikes is rapidly increasing.” He turned and he left, his amusement with the situation ebbing away.  
  
Those turquoise eyes rested on his back for a minute longer. Then the girl quietly turned back around, falling into a martial arts stance and returning to striking against the wall. _“Ichi. Ni. San.”_  
  
As her upper body twisted with each punch thrown, a necklace that she wore bounced. If the room had been well-lit, it would have been easy to tell the shape. However, thanks to the darkness, it would have been difficult for anyone without good eyesight to see the star outline and kanji for “water” in the center.


	5. A Hop, a Skip, and a Jump

I sat on the hard wood, eyes closed and breath coming in a long, natural flow. A pink kimono with a white rose petal and bright green leaf design flowed off of my body. My legs, boasting thick thighs from my recent cross-country running endurance and speed training, were crossed like a pretzel. My hands rested on my knees, palm up and open with my pointer finger touching my thumb in the same way Mother always did when she meditated.

 _In. Out. In. Out._

I felt the tingly, energetic rush of chakra flowing throughout my body. It flowed where it wanted, much of it starting in my brain or bones, and emanating to other areas of my body. Concentrating, I directed chakra and diverted it towards my hands. I mentally split it in half; the chakra in the left half of my body I imagined as rushing water, while the chakra in my right side I imagined as electricity coursing through wires. The chakra on my right side responded more quickly, more easily, to my manipulations. With some, but little, resistance, it slowly morphed into lightning chakra nature. I could feel it sparkle, crackle in me, like an exciteable kid begging to be let loose and play.

The chakra on my left side pushed back. It resisted more, refused to bend to my will. It was already difficult enough forming water chakra as a single chakra nature, but forming both water AND lightning chakra… I gritted my teeth, a bead of sweat rolling down my cheek. I could feel my nerves rise the more I imagined the chakra as a river.

 _“Failure,”_ the whispers of the remaining members of my clan who weren’t my parents rose up in the back of my mind.

My concentration weakened, and I could feel what progress I’d made in my left side break completely, while my right side’s lightning chakra weakened and became a strange mixture of normal chakra and lightning chakra nature. I cursed, and set to work again. Come on. I’ve done this before… albeit inconsistently. I could do this again. Taking several deep breaths to calm my building nerves, then when I felt more secure, restarted the process.

Maybe it wouldn’t be as bad if I wasn’t sitting on the fishing docks of Lake Tomoe.

Once again, the chakra on my left side responded with few protests, allowing itself to be shaped into the lightning chakra I desired it to. My water chakra still didn’t form easily, but as I kept my breathing steady, it submitted more and more. Even with just a little water chakra, it was possible to use Fluid Style, so long as you had some lightning chakra, too, but the more of each type of chakra nature you built up, the more powerful any jutsu you used could become.

My hands flew through some seals. _Tiger, Tiger, Ox, Tiger, Boar_. “Fluid Style: Water Smithy!” I called out, and water pulled out from my blood, from my cells, from any part of my body that had excess water, and flowed out towards my hand. It formed into a long katana. It still LOOKED like water, but also glowed with yellow light; that was the lightning chakra holding it together.

I frowned at the training dummy in front of me, which I’d brought from my family’s house up here to the docks, and tensed my arm. I stood up, cracking my neck. My hand dug into the hilt of the watery sword, and I jumped backwards, flipping before twisting my body.

“Great Gully!”

A beam of blue and yellow shot from the sword, slicing through the air and connecting with the training dummy. It sliced clean through, wood cracking and snapping as the newly sliced-off top half slid off of the bottom half and bounced off the dock. With impressive momentum, it rolled away and splashed into Lake Tomoe, bobbing up to the surface a second later. I landed on both feet smoothly, using chakra to reduce any strain to my legs.

My sword was about a third as thick, now, but I smiled, pride welling within me. From how destroyed the dummy looked—and wait, even the docks behind it had been absolutely wrecked, too—that Jutsu had surpassed the C-Ranks I’d only ever managed before. It had maybe even reached B-Rank, though probably not quite. If I could achieve a change in chakra form on TOP of my change in chakra nature, I could push it even further up to a mid-A Rank, but that’d take both greater chakra control than I could ever hope to achieve at my current level, and better control over my ingrained fear of water.

Still, a proud, bubbly laugh rose up from me, and ideas raced through my mind. What could I do with an actual water gun…?

 _Heheheh. That’d totally catch a few ninja off-guard._

“I see your chakra technique is improving,” the proud voice of my father said from behind me, and I spun around in surprise. My control instantly fell apart. The water making up my sword instantly broke apart, falling down to the docks and creating a small puddle Father smiled kindly, nodding. “Now you just need to work on getting that down consistently. You don’t want to be caught in a scenario where you need a higher-level Jutsu to protect you or to attack with, and have it be too weak to save you or deal enough damage.”

I winced, both from the critique and the thought that I’d have to be hurting people, real people, soon. Granted, I’d be hurting people who mainly wanted me dead, but still. It didn’t feel right. Even criminals had rights.

Father, studying me, frowned. “Something wrong, Ren?” he asked gently, putting a hand on my shoulder. “Nervous about your big test tomorrow?”

“Not really,” I sighed, giving him a weak smile. And it was true; I wasn’t nervous at all. I’d done enough studying of chakra control and usage that I was pretty confident I would pass. Besides, this was my big day to prove to everyone that I was a true Konoha shinobi, even if my past self would have cringed big time at the thought of being—well, I was essentially a soldier. A _child_ soldier at that.

Yeah, this world was more than a little fucked up.

Father held out a fist, and I bumped my own against it. “Attaboy,” he said approvingly, ruffling my navy hair. “Go get ‘em, tiger. Make us proud and prove our idiot relatives wrong.”

Let me just say this, my parents were _amazingly_ supportive. I mean, maybe being supportive of sending your kids out to be a child soldier wasn’t exactly all that morally good by my old world’s standards, but still, I loved them to death. No matter how difficult it had been training me our how many times I’d failed, and failed, kept on failing, Father and Mother had never looked at me any differently. They never raised their voices in anger or frustration. They just calmly critiqued where I’d went wrong, and helped me learn what to do better. Which was really something considering that it took me three years to build up my control over water chakra nature to the somewhat decent level it was at, and just one year to complete my lightning nature.

And that was considering that I was a water-type, _not_ a lightning-type.

Mother kissed me on the cheek and gave me another of her now class-wide famous bento boxes. I took it gratefully, as well as the second one that she’d prepared for Naruko, and headed off for class. I ignored the looks I got from the civilians as I made my way to the Academy, despite the fact that they were particularly nasty today. I arrived in class three minutes early. There was a strange buzz in the air, and I blinked as I looked around.

“Hey, Ren,” Chouji greeted as I sat down in my usual seat. I glanced back at him.

“Yo, what’s up?” I asked, blinking.

He shoved a few chips in his mouth. “Do you know where Naruko and Iruka-sensei are?”

I shook my head, rubbing the back of my hair. “No idea.” Wait… Today was approaching _that_ day… And Naruko was gone…? That meant… Hm…

Seven minutes after class was supposed to start, an exasperated Iruka-sensei tugged a sheepish Naruko in through the door. The blonde struggled in some ropes, and Iruka took her to the front of the class to get a stern talking to. “Naruko, you’ve been doing a lot better lately with your taijutsu, but you’re still the worst in the class when it comes to ninjutsu!” he chided. “You shouldn’t be pranking and should instead be sitting in class, studying, so you don’t fail the graduation test like you have the last one, and the one before that!”

Yeah, this all felt very familiar. I sighed wearily, hanging my head. I’d tried to get her to attend class more, and she HAD, but… that wasn’t saying much when she used to skip just about every other day in order to go out pranking. I tried to teach her better chakra control, too, but she still was absolutely terrible at the Clone and Replacement Jutsus. At least she could pull off a pretty mean Transformation.

Naruko stuck her tongue out at Iruka-sensei as he told her off, and Iruka’s face twitched.

“Alright, I’ve decided. We’ll have a re-test on Transformation Jutsu! Even those who already passed will take it!”

Weary groans and complaints rose up from the class. I just shook my head in amusement, even as nerves started to rise within me. _Welp. Here it is. Canon_. The start of the shitstorm the next three years would come to be… unless I could successfully prevent some of the major plot points.

Sakura went first. She successfully transformed into an absolutely perfect copy of our teacher, which was to be expected, really. Of all the students, she had the highest level of chakra control, with Shikamaru coming to a close second. When Iruka gave her a proud nod and wrote down her grade—definitely a 100 percent—on the paper he had on his clipboard, she skipped happily over to Ino and wrapped her in a big hug.

“Did you see that, Ino!?” she cried out proudly. “That was my best one yet!”

Ino chuckled and squeezed her. “Yeah, you did really good,” she said softly. “Good job, Sakura.” I smiled at the sight; ever since Ino had calmed down from the shock my knowledge had brought her, she had decided there was no way she’d lose her best friend because of some silly thing like a feud over a guy. Part of that might have come from the fact that it was made abundantly clear to her Sasuke wasn’t interested. And with how much closer their friendship had become, Sakura had naturally been drawn in enough that she stopped completely fawning over Sasuke. She still clearly crushed on Sasuke hard, but it wasn’t they all-pervasive annoyance of canon Sakura.

Now I suspected the reason that she had done that so much in canon was because she had been lonely and was seeking attention, and then it just ended up becoming habit.

Sasuke came up next, performing a near-perfect Transformation, which received Iruka’s approval, and he released it before quietly shuffling off to the end of the line.

“Ren, I’d like you to go next, please,” Iruka told me with a gentle smile.

I nodded and stepped up, taking a deep breath. My hands formed the seals for the Transformation Jutsu—dog, boar, ram—and smoke burst out, covering me before dissipating. When it cleared, a solid likeness to Iruka stood in my place. It wasn’t quite as good as Sakura’s or Sasuke’s, the hair color being slightly lighter than the real Iruka’s, but it wasn’t very noticeable and no where near bad enough that it would make me lose more than two points.

Naruko stepped up after me, smirking. I facepalmed, almost too afraid to watch.

 _Oh, Naruko, what are you about to do?_

Naruko’s hands formed the ram seal, and smoke burst out around her. When it cleared, my face went totally red. Standing there was an older-looking Naruko, naked, with far more sizable breasts, and a pair of fuzzy fox ears and a fox tail.

Poor Iruka’s jaw dropped, and he nearly passed out from shock.

“Heheh!” Naruko snickered, tail flicking proudly. “How do you like my Foxy Jutsu?” she asked him, turning to wink at me.

 _Wait, Foxy Jutsu? Not Sexy Jutsu?_

All eyes in the room, previously staring in various degrees of surprise, anger, and embarrassment, swiftly turned to me, and my jaw dropped just like our teacher’s. Ino’s stare was particularly deep. “H-Hey, wait, why are you winking at me like that—?” I started stammering horribly, quickly looking anywhere BUT at Naruko, and then blinked as I remembered a conversation I’d had with the girl recently during recess.

 _“Naruko, I know you don’t like reading, but you just_ have _to read this book!” I gushed, grinning at her and handing her a book I’d picked up from the library. “It’s probably one of my favorites I’ve read. And it has tons of action, so you wouldn’t be very bored.”_

 _Naruko frowned at it distastefully. “Ew, books.” Her eyes skimmed over the cover, and she read aloud, “_ That Time My Jounin Sensei Died But Was Brought Back as a Fox Girl… _what the heck is this? And why does that woman on the cover have fox ears and a fox tail?”_

 _“It’s about an older genin team and is set in the Third Shinobi World War,” I explained, eager to divulge the plot. But not too much! People who spoil novels deserve to rot in jail, after all! “The genin team are tasked with protecting a shrine built to honor the Fox Summons, and some bandits attack. But the bandits turn out to be way tougher than the team expected, and their Jounin-sensei ends up getting killed! But the Foxes saw some serious potential in her, and decided it wouldn’t do for her to die just yet, so they brought her back to life, but the only way they could do that was by combining their chakra with her soul, so she comes back as half-fox, half-human, and she’s SUPER cute…”_

 _I rambled off, and Naruko stared at me. “You like some WEIRD books.”_

 _I blushed. “What!? Oh, come on, it’s not even like there’s anything… well…” I blushed even deeper, and Naruko cackled, bending over and laughing hard at my expense._

…Oh.

Um.

……..Oops?

“ _Ren-san,_ ” Ino whispered in my ear, leaning over and giving me a beatific smile that spoke of horrors man should never see. “We don’t need to have a _talk_ about this, do we?”

“Nope! Definitely not!” Ino could be _terrifying_ when she wanted to be.

Iruka straightened back up, coughing and reasserting himself before GLARING at Naruko. “NA. RU. KO. Don’t make such perverted jutsus! It’s not safe for a kunoichi!” He took a deep breath, ignoring the laughter Naruko pelted out as she dispelled the transformation and walked to the back of the line, then called out, “Hinata, you’re next.” No response came, and he blinked. “Hinata?”

We all glanced to where Hinata had been standing, and saw that she’d passed out with a massive blush. Some blood trickled out of her nose.

“…I suppose we’ll do her last, then.”

The rest of the day passed without much incident, though as the class ended, Iruka dragged Naruko back to the Hokage Mountain, where apparently she’d graffitied the faces just like in canon. Feeling more confident in my ability to pass the test since my grade had been returned to me and I’d gotten a 98, I slept well that night after a good round of more chakra control exercising.

I dreamt of petting cute fox girls. Many of them were blonde. Somehow I couldn’t really look at Naruko the next morning in class without feeling supremely uncomfortable.

 _Her hair looks really scritchable._

 _Shut up, brain! Scritchable isn’t even a word!_

Most of the day went by pretty well, until we reached the last class period. That was when Iruka smiled at us. “Alright, class, today’s the big day,” he said softly. “Today, we’ll be taking graduation exams. Many of you will become genin. When your name is called, proceed to the next classroom. The test will be over the Clone Jutsu.” Beside me, poor Naruko stiffened and paled. For whatever reason, Clone Jutsu had always been her absolute worst. It was kinda strange thinking about that, since she excelled so much at the Shadow Clone. I wondered what exactly was different between the two that caused her to be able to use one and not the other? “Your goal will be to make three stable, accurate clones. If you make all three, you are guaranteed a passing grade.”

The energy in the room was palpable. At long last, our big day was finally here. The biggest day of our lives—at least, as far as eleven or twelve year old kids who had no idea what the future held in store were concerned.

We went by alphabetical order of our first names. It would’ve been by our family names, but since we had at least one or two orphans in our class, that wouldn’t have worked out very well. Orphans didn’t have family names, because they didn’t have family.

Naruko never came back from her test. When Iruka, who was one of the test proctors alongside Mizuki-sensei, returned with the previous student and smiled at me, I got up and hurried over to him, eager to get this done.

“You’ve been doing a fantastic job in class these last few years, Ren,” Iruka, who had gotten close enough with us over time that he had started calling us by our first names, told me as we walked down the hall to the testing room. “Know that even if you don’t pass today, I’ll be very proud of your efforts.”

I couldn’t help the warm smile that spread up my face. Iruka was _amazing_. Truly too nice for this world.

“Thanks,” I said softly, confidence rising. “But I don’t intend to fail. I’m definitely going to pass this test.”

“I’m proud to say that I’m very confident you will,” he agreed, opening the door for me and ushering me in. My kimono brushed against my feet as I entered, making my way to the front of the class and standing in front of the desk. Mizuki-sensei sat on the right side of the desk, with Iruka-sensei sitting on the left side of the desk. My smile dimmed into a frown as I glanced at Mizuki, knowing his plans of betrayal.

But… If I didn’t let it all happen…

I sucked in a breath, calming the sudden bundle of nerves that arose within me.

“Alright, whenever you’re ready,” Mizuki-sensei said softly. I could sense his dislike from here. He’d never been a terribly huge fan of me. Today, I’d prove him wrong. I’d prove everyone wrong. I wasn’t a failure, or a traitor. I was the man who’d ensure that all of my friends would be safe, and that Naruko would fulfill her destiny and become Hokage.

 _Ram. Snake. Tiger._

“Clone Jutsu!”

I grinned widely as my chakra shifted, leaving my body, and formed into five different identical, intangible clones. Iruka’s eyes widened in delight, while Mizuki’s expression looked oddly neutral. I hadn’t made just three, the standard, I’d made five. I held them for half a minute, then let out a breath of air, relaxing and dispelling them. Iruka glanced at Mizuki, who, resigned, nodded in tune with Iruka himself. Then my teacher grinned widely and grabbed a shinobi headband off of the desk, handing it to me. The flexible metal gleamed with reflected light, the leaf symbol etched finely into the center. I took it with almost trepidation, biting my lip happily as I pondered where to put it.

Then, almost like a collar, I tied it around my neck.

“It suits you very well, Ren,” Iruka said softly, wrapping me up in a hug. “You’ll grow into a wonderful shinobi. I can already sense it in you. I know you have the Will of Fire. Every day, I say you happily working with your fellow classmates, treating all of them as equals, as friends. You were the first in the class to truly accept Naruko. You have no idea how proud I am to have been your teacher, and how happy I am that you came out of your shell. That you have helped so many others break out of theirs.”

Emotion squeezed in my heart as I suddenly realized that from here on out, it would be only on rare occasion that I would ever see Iruka again. He was no longer my teacher, because I was a genin.

I was a genin.

 _I was a shinobi_.

I wrapped Iruka in a hug, too, squeezing him softly. “I’ll miss having you as my teacher, Iruka-sensei,” I murmured. “You were the absolute best.”

“And I’ll miss having you as my student.” He patted my shoulder, releasing the hug. “But I’ll be eager to see you move on to great heights.”

When I returned to the classroom, Ino smiled and smirked. “I knew you had it in you somewhere,” she teased, tapping my ‘collar’ headband. “Bit of an odd place to put it.”

My hand rose up and swatted hers away. “Aw, shut up, it looks cool and you know it.” I grinned, chuckling, and she chuckled too. As terrified of her as she could make me, she was definitely a fantastic friend. And she’d even gotten me this kimono as a birthday present last year, which had made me super grateful.

I had to hand it to her; she knew fashion.

When the last student had taken the test and passed, class ended, and we all chatted amongst ourselves happily as we left… to see our parents waiting for us at the entrance to the Academy. Mother and Father smiled happily and Father leaped forwards, pulling me into a hug. “Don’t think I don’t see that leaf headband, Ren!” Father laughed, nearly squeezing the life out of me. “You passed! I knew you could do it!”

“It really wasn’t that difficult,” I said sheepishly, warmth and happiness bubbling inside of me.

Mother’s smile wasn’t as wide as Father’s, but it was serene and lovely. “You’ll love the salad I’ll have waiting for you at home,” she promised, kissing me on the cheek. I turned to grin back at her, only for my eyes to look past her… and see a lone Naruko, dejectedly sitting on the wooden swing that had been tied to a tree’s branch, with no headband in place.

My good mood plummeted instantly and I pulled away from Mother and Father to go over towards my friend.

“Hey, Naruko,” I said gently, approaching her. I could see my parents’ curious gazes.

“Hey,” she said. She looked lifeless, eyes dead. She sounded as bad as she looked.

 _Poor girl._ She was the only one of us who hadn’t passed. I opened my mouth, frowned, closed it, then said quietly—“I’m sorry.”

Naruko flinched and didn’t say anything back.

Grass rustled behind me, and I blinked, looking over my shoulder. Mizuki was walking up to us, a serene smile on his face. “Ah, Ren, may I speak to Naruko alone, please?” he said innocently. If I hadn’t known any better, I probably would’ve been fooled. As it was, I narrowed my eyes, even as life returned to Naruko’s eyes and she looked up to him with bafflement and… _hope_.

“I’m sure you could say anything it is you need to say with me here, right?” I said, equally as innocent. His façade dropped JUST a moment, annoyance crossing his features, but he wiped it away as quickly as it had appeared.

“Hm…” He studied me for a moment, then seemed to consider something. “Well, I suppose it would be good for you to hear this as well, actually. But I’d like it to be away from any other prying eyes, if possible?”

Wait, what? That threw me off-guard completely. I narrowed my eyes. What was he planning?

“Uh… okay.”

“Wonderful. Follow me, then, please, both of you.” His gaze landed on Naruko, and he smiled a pretend-gentle smile. “It’s about your grade, dear.”

“My… grade?” Obviously happy, she nodded eagerly and grinned as he leaped away, heading off into the city. Naruko and I glanced at each other, then chased off. I could hear my parents’ shouts of confusion in the distance, but I ignored them. He led us deep into the town, hopping from rooftop to rooftop. At last, he stopped, and sat on the edge of one of them. We did the same, sitting beside him and panting.

“You know. Naruko,” he said softly. “Iruka isn’t trying to be hard on you.”

“Then why is it only him who gives me a hard time!?” Naruko whined, pouting in disbelief. I frowned deeply.

“He wants you to become strong from the bottom of his heart,” Mizuki replied. He glanced at me. “He’s always wanted _both_ of you to do that. He doesn’t have parents. He lost many people in his family.”

Naruko hesitated, and I glanced at our sensei. The _actual_ traitor. “Is there a point to why you’re saying this?” I asked him.

“There is,” he agreed gently. “Naruko, do you want to graduate? And do you want to help her graduate, Ren?”

“OF COURSE!” Naruko burst out, lip quivering. “I wanted to so badly…”

Shackles raised, I bit my lip. Shit. Now I’d just seem like a bad friend if I refused. But if I agreed, and we got caught… Then I’d look like the traitor everyone made me out to be. Shit. That was his game, wasn’t it? Hatred, pure and deep, flowed in my veins.

Dammit.

“Yeah, I do,” I told him quietly.

Smirking, he shook his head. “Well, looks like I have no choice…” He gave Naruko a sidelong glance. “I’m gonna let you in on a big secret.”

~o~

  
Ino paced the floor of her bedroom, chewing her lip nervously. Tonight was the big night. She could still remember it all clearly. How could she not have? It had been such a jarring, _impossible_ experience. And she’d even requested Ren let her see it all again multiple times just to make sure she got everything down right after she’d calmed. Tonight was the night that strange, animated story about her and her classmates’ future began.

If everything happened like it did normally, then it was complete and utter proof… complete proof that Ren’s memories were… Well, at least accurate on the important details.

She continued pacing about, taking a nervous swig of water from a cup on her desk. She couldn’t help the worry eating at her. _Please be safe, Naruko. Iruka-sensei._

Suddenly, a high-pitched wail split the air. Ino’s eyes widened. That siren… It was the alert for a security threat so bad all jounin were required to be present! No way… So then, then… All of it was _actually_ true!? She felt a little sick to her stomach. She had to sit on her bed, biting her lip and tapping her finger against the edge.

After an hour, she saw heard the door open downstairs and rushed out of her room, glancing up at her relieved father.

“What happened?” she demanded, her mother equally worried.

“Nothing bad,” he said softly, wrapping them in a hug. “Or at least, it didn’t turn out bad. Your teacher, Mizuki, had reported that your friends, Naruko and Ren, had stolen the Scroll of Sealing.”

“ _Ren_ too!?” she burst out, the unexpectedness of that information throwing her completely off her rocker.

“I…” Shame rose up on his face. “I couldn’t help but assume the worst. I thought that Ren and Naruko had betrayed the village. But apparently, Iruka found them first, and then got attacked by Mizuki… who, as it turns out, had been the one behind it all. He’d told them if they successfully took the scroll, Naruko could pass the graduation test. They’d trusted him, but all along, he’d been planning on killing them and stealing the scroll for himself, then putting the blame on Ren. But Iruka, Naruko, and Ren managed to defeat him. They’re alright, though Iruka suffered a couple severe injuries and is being ordered to rest.”

Both Ino and her mother let out a breath of relief.

“Oh, thank the gods,” her mother breathed. “It would’ve been horrible if that poor girl had actually used Naruko to…”

Inoichi gave his wife a _look_ , and she jolted a bit, before smiling sheepishly. Previously, Ino wouldn’t have noticed or understood; but now, with a frown, she suddenly realized that her Mother was talking about Naruko’s status as a Jinchuuriki.

“Well, it would have been horrible if she had actually turned out to be the traitor everyone seems to assume she is.”

“Mom,” Ino said slowly, “Ren is a boy.”

For once, Yamanaka Suzuki looked utterly flabbergasted. “…She… Ah, he is? …I had no idea,” she admitted. “I had just assumed…”

“Most people assume that unless they’re our classmates, his relatives, or have access to his files,” Ino giggled, patting her on the arm sympathetically. “I thought the same thing on our first day of school.” Her mom knew what Ren had looked like because they’d met on Ren’s previous birthday, having taken Ino to the Kawase’s lakefront home last year on his birthday so that she could give him that _gorgeous_ kimono.

All that said, she finally allowed herself to relax a little. Everything had turned out well, just like it had in the story. Even if somehow REN had been a part of it, too. Silently, she wondered if Ren had learned any jutsus from the Scroll of Sealing. If he had, it might be a huge boon to their efforts in changing the future.

She supposed she’d just have to ask him tomorrow.

And so, with a much lighter heart than she’d had when the siren had went off, she returned to bed.


	6. The Peak of Youth

Naruko’s energy as she skipped through the halls into their classroom that day, early for the first time in forever, was exuberantly high. For good reason, too; first, she’d learned a _freakin’ awesome_ Jutsu, dattebayo! She could totally kick Sasuke’s butt with it! She was sure the look on his face when he saw it would be _amazing_! Second, she’d gained something akin to the first real father figure she’d ever had in Iruka-sensei. Really, he was just way too amazing and she didn’t deserve him. And third…  
  
 _Blood dripping from the wound created by the two kunai stabbed into his shoulder and leg, shaking but refusing to fall over, Ren pulled the blood and formed a protective shield around Naruko with it. Her eyes widened, and, shaking, she gazed up at Ren through tears.  
  
“Stop!” she begged, reaching out with a trembly arm. “Why are you protecting me!? You heard what he said, I’m a monster!”  
  
“You’re _not _a monster!” Ren insisted, turning to look at her with an intense sincerity as Mizuki and Iruka fought with the intent to kill. The sounds of metal kunai and shuriken clinging against each other rang through the forest, but he didn’t flinch. “You’re a human, just like me! Just like Iruka-sensei! I don’t care what you have inside of you! Every human on this planet has at least some darkness inside of them, something monstrous, but what matters is whether you act on that monstrous part of you or you be kind in spite of it! And Naruko, I know for a fact that you’d NEVER willfully act on the darkness inside of you! You’re a human, the best of us, and I swear, that as long as my blood flows, I’ll stand by your side, and make sure that your dream of becoming Hokage is reality!”_  
  
Warmth rose in her chest from the memory, and it even allowed her to ignore the surprised and suspicious stares of the other students as she entered. (They kind of had a right to be surprised and suspicious, anyway. They didn’t know what had happened two nights ago and the last they’d heard, she’d failed.)  
  
The door opened, and Ren stepped through, this time wearing a… rather feminine yukata with a design of doves and lilies. Naruko held back a giggle. His choice of clothing was so weird for a guy, but it also suited him. Her amusement shifted to concern as he stumbled towards his desk, favoring his left, uninjured leg pretty heavily. Her eyes furrowed in concern. “You okay?” she asked him.  
  
“Oh, hey, Naru…ko…” he said, trailing off as he looked at her and froze. For several long seconds, he didn’t say anything, and Naruko grew a little nervous. Did he hate her after all? Was everything he said a lie? Then she jumped when he suddenly screamed in what sounded like pain and almost started pulling his hair out. “GAAAAH! I’M SO SORRY!”  
  
Eh? Wait, what? “S-Sorry, why are you sorry!?” she stammered, blinking rapidly as all eyes in the room turned to them.  
  
“I SOUNDED SO UNCOOL THE OTHER NIGHT! AAAAAGH! How could I have said such uncool things!? I SOUNDED LIKE A MORON! AAAAAAAAAAGH!”  
  
 _E-Eh?_  
  
He collapsed in his seat and his head hit the desk with a heavy _thunk_ , drawing a wince from Naruko. He just groaned and continued whining into the wood, though the words were somewhat more muffled now. “I mean, really, as long as my blood flows!? Everyone has darkness inside of them!? How fucking cliché is that!?” He got up, turned to her, and bowed low, hands at his side and a depressed aura around him. “I’m so sorry for sounding like a b-rate action series side character!”  
  
Naruko blinked. Oh. _That’s_ why he was freaking out. She burst out in a giggle, then shook her head, smiling softly. “It’s okay, Ren,” she said quietly. “It made me really happy.”  
  
“Eh?” He got up from his bow, staring at her dumbly. “You didn’t think I sounded stupid?”  
  
“Of course not! Are you an idiot?”  
  
“Why are you two being so troublesome already?” a weary Shikamaru groaned from the back of the class.  
  
“U-Um, N-Naruko-chan…” Hinata said softly a few seats away, unable to quite look at her. Naruko blinked dubiously at her. What was she mumbling about now? She spoke so quietly that the blonde could hardly hear her. “I’m g-g-glad that you w-were able t-to p-p-pass.” Even after years of Ren trying to help Hinata open up, the girl was still a stammering mess. It was kind of sad, really. Especially since the Hyuuga was pretty cute.  
  
Still, it was weird how _shy_ she was around Naruko. Like, what? Why? The Uzumaki didn’t get it.  
  
She shrugged and gave the quiet girl a big thumbs-up and a ramen-worthy grin. “Heheheh! You betcha! The future Hokage can’t fail some dumb graduation exam!” (The fact that she had failed three graduation exams and only passed because she essentially committed and then exposed crime was carefully shoved in the recesses of her mind.)  
  
Hinata’s eyes shone at that, and Ren just shook his head with an equal parts exasperated and fond grin. “I don’t know if that’s compartmentalization or if you’re just that bold…” he muttered with a chuckle.  
  
The door opened again while they teased each other, and Ino and Sakura both entered, talking happily about something ninja-related. Naruko’s head perked up and she smiled widely at Sakura-chan. She was so cute! That pink hair was really unusual, and it stood out in a good way. It looked really silky, too! Honestly, the blonde was jealous, jealous of both Sakura _and_ Ren’s hair. How did they get their hair so smooth!? Ren wasn’t even a girl!!!  
  
“Oi, Sakura-chan!” Naruko called, waving cheerfully.  
  
Sakura’s eyes fell on her and she blinked, startled. “Eh—Naruko-chan!? But I thought that you…!”  
  
“I heard about it from Ren yesterday,” Ino told her, smiling softly. “We happened to be getting our IDs done at the same time and he told me that Naruko apparently passed some secret test or something.”  
  
Sakura stared between Ino and Naruko, mouth opening and then closing. “Secret test, huh…?” she mused, canting her head to the side in the most adorable sign of confusion Naruko had ever seen. She perked up, however, and smiled at the whiskered blonde. “Well, I’m glad you passed, anyway.” Ever since Ren started talking with everyone three years ago, Sakura had stopped hitting Naruko as much and seemed a lot more accepting of her. Something which she was very grateful for, honestly. Sakura may not have been terribly good at taijutsu, but her fists could still hurt. In any case, they weren’t quite friends, but they at least got along decently well.  
  
“Thanks!” Naruko, beaming, chirped back, sunshine and rainbows.  
  
Ren stared at her. “Scritchable…” he muttered so quietly she didn’t quite hear it, and glanced at him, blinking.  
  
“Eh?”  
  
He blushed. “Nothing.” He reached out and patted her on the head like she was a little kid; she blinked in surprise and jerked away almost instinctively, though… it didn’t feel bad, exactly. It was strange, but then, Ren was strange, and she just accepted that. After all, that strangeness was why he was one of her favorite people in the entire world.  
  


~o~

  
Iruka came in soon after everyone had settled down in their seats for their Genin Orientation. His eyes swept over Naruko and I, and he smiled fondly. I grinned back at him, my appreciation for him having only shot through the roof since our fight against Mizuki. The man really was probably the best adult in the entire city, other than my own parents; but then, I was biased, really.  
  
“Congratulations to everyone in this orientation,” Iruka started, wearing his Chunin vest with a proud, warm smile at all of us. “Starting today, you have officially graduated from the Academy and are now fully-fledged ninja of the Hidden Leaf. But be prepared. You’re still just Konoha Genin, You have a long, arduous road ahead of you. You’ll make friends, but you’ll also make many enemies. You will see things that I could never prepare you mentally for, no matter how hard I try. But know that I am proud to be able to call all of you my comrades.”  
  
Iruka began to pace around softly as he continued.  
  
“Today you will be sorted into your Genin teams and be assigned a Jounin-sensei. Normally,” he added, examining us with a raised eyebrow, “you would be divided into squads of three. However, this year is… a little different. We have a number of graduates that is not a multiple of three, and as such, we’ll have to change things up. It’s rare that this happens, but not unheard of, and I suppose this is just one of those years.”  
  
Confusion murmured throughout the class, and I furrowed my eyes as well, tilting my head. What would they be doing with something like this?  
  
And what team would I be getting on? I… Well, a part of me wanted to get on Team 7, assuming the teams were assigned as they were in canon, but also—PLOT. Being a member of Team 7 meant instant access to a firsthand seat at all of the nasties that wanted to kill you. It also probably meant I’d naturally become one of the strongest ninja in the world, but that was only if I managed to survive long enough, and, well, I held confidence in myself, sure, but not _that_ much confidence.  
  
I hummed, wondering what other teams might be a good fit for me. Team 8, maybe? Well, they were more of a tracking team than anything, and while the new Jutsu I acquired was pretty decent for tracking, that wasn’t really up my ally. Ino-Shika-Cho; Team 10? Maybe; I could provide good support for Shikamaru and Ino.  
  
“The teams are chosen in a manner that evens out the team and makes up for each member’s strengths and weaknesses,” Iruka explained. “Now, listen closely so you don’t miss your name.” He ran down through several teams, and when he got to Team 7, he announced, “Uzumaki, Naruko. Hyuuga, Hinata. Uchiha, Sasuke.”  
  
Naruko seemed pretty happy with that, though she did frown at Sasuke. Sasuke let out something that sounded like a pained groan. I wondered what exactly it was he was annoyed with.  
  
Well, looks like I wasn’t on Team 7, after all. Well, this was exactly what I’d… expected…  
  
 _Hold on, what was that he said? Hinata’s on Team 7? Eh? Ehhhhhh?_  
  
A squeak of surprise and embarrassment rose up from the back row, and I glanced behind me to see a tomato—oh, wait, no, that was just Hinata’s face. Well, _someone’s_ very happy with the results. My mind was absolutely reeling though, and a quick glance to Ino saw that she was as stunned as I felt. What the hell had changed to have Hinata get placed on Naruko’s team!? Was it just the fact that Sakura’s grades had risen steadily since Ino remained her friend?  
  
“Team 8 is up next,” Iruka said next. “Haruno, Sakura. Inuzuka, Kiba. Aburame, Shino.”  
  
Shino adjusted his glasses, nodding. What an odd kid. I never quite knew what to say around him. But, whoa, Sakura’s joining Team 8 instead? What the hell!? Weird… maybe they figured it would be good for them to have her because of her potential as a medic?  
  
Team 9 consisted of Ami and a couple civilians—now that was a group that was doomed to fail—and Ino-Shika-Cho went as expected. But that was everyone except me done and dusted; we’d had thirty-one kids in our class. I blinked rapidly. Wait, wait, my name hadn’t been called! Eh?? Was I not getting placed on a team after all? Would I just be automatically sent to Genin Reserves!?  
  
I slumped in depression. Man… I at least wanted to _do_ something with my status as a ninja…  
  
“And lastly, for the solution to our unusual problem,” Iruka said with a smile directed at me, “Kawase, Ren. You will be placed as a fourth member to one of our older Genin Teams. Now, then, everyone, after lunch break, you are to return here so that you can join up with your Jounin-sensei.”  
  
“Hai, Iruka-sensei,” everyone said with wide, excited smiles.  
  
Everyone got up to go eat, and Hinata nervously wobbled up to Naruko and I as we left together. “U-U-Um,” she stammered, eyes darting between the whiskered blonde and I. “S-Since we’re on t-the s-same team n-n-now… W-Would you m-mind if I… if I… ”  
  
Naruko, bless her heart, had no idea what was happening. “If you what?” she asked in genuine confusion.  
  
I poked her on the forehead, shaking my head in amusement. “Idiot. She’s asking if you want to eat lunch with her.”  
  
“Oh.” She shrugged and gave a thumbs-up. “Sure, Hinata-chan, ‘ttebayo!”  
  
I didn’t think it was possible for Hinata’s cheeks to turn any redder than they had when she found out they were on a team together, but somehow they did. Even her ears burned up. I grinned.  
  
“Keep this one, Naruko,” I stage-whispered. “She’s good for you.”  
  
“Eh?”  
  
While the blonde just blinked in confusion, Hinata wobbled from my statement. I figured that if Naruko hadn’t noticed and put a friendly hand on her back and steered her outside after I handed the blonde a lunch from my mom, the tiny and shy Hyuuga would have fallen over. I snickered; she was really fun to mess with. Still, poor girl. Hopefully being on Team 7 would be good for her.  
  
…Hm. I wondered how this would change the Zabuza Arc and the Forest of Death?  
  
 _Sorry, Hinata-chan. You’re in for a lot of drama._  
  
Lunch passed without much difficulty. I ate alone under the tree where I first met Naruko, taking the time to meditate. Mom had packed me some onigiri and veggies today, along with some sashimi. I got done with lunch about ten minutes before we had to return to the classroom to wait for our Jounin-sensei to show. So, with the extra time on my hands, I grinned and decided to practice the new Jutsu I’d learned.  
  
 _Dog, Boar, Dog, Boar, Dog, Boar, Ram._  
  
“Perfect Transformation!”  
  
Smoke billowed around me, and I felt an odd tingle rush through me. It wasn’t very pleasant, but it wasn’t painful, either; more… _uncomfortable_. When it cleared, in my place stood… well, me, but I had twin cat ears, and a cat tail. My human ears were gone. Also, I was a little shorter, and had actual breasts.  
  
“Wow, this feels weird,” I muttered, my voice even higher and more feminine than it normally was.  
  
The Perfect Transformation Jutsu was a B-Rank difficulty due to the intensive chakra requirement to pull it off, the amount of chakra control needed for it, as well as how hard it was to master. It differed from the main Transformation Jutsu in a couple ways. First and foremost, while the main Transformation Jutsu only lasted as long as the user’s chakra reserves allowed, the Perfect Transformation sacrificed a much higher amount of chakra for permanent transformation. It didn’t matter how low your chakra reserves got; so long as you didn’t use the Jutsu to turn into something else, you’d remain in the transformed state pretty much forever. The exceptions to this included falling unconscious and death; or if someone touched you and disturbed your chakra system like when dispelling a genjutsu.  
  
Second, as the name implies, it was a _perfect_ transformation. Basically, the original transformation just gave cosmetic changes. You didn’t _actually become_ something else. You were still you. You still had the same DNA. Even when people transform into kunai and shuriken, they still have human genetics and chakra flow and stuff. (Hence why, in canon, when Naruto and Sasuke performed their trick with the shuriken against Zabuza, Sasuke instantly knew the transformed Naruto was Naruto.) With the Perfect Transformation, however, you _actually_ , completely turned into… whatever it was you’re turning into.  
  
The Sexy Jutsu? Or, the Foxy Jutsu, as it were? It was just a _cosmetic_ change. Naruko didn’t actually gain foxgirl DNA or anything. Right now, my DNA was 100% female, 100% catgirl.  
  
Sadly, the one exception to this idea was that turning into, say, a younger kid with the Perfect Transformation wouldn’t extend your lifespan and reset the clock on your lifetime.  
  
Oh, and lastly, the biggest difference between the Perfect Transformation and normal Transformation was that the latter couldn’t be used on other people. You could _only_ transform yourself. This one _could_. And that, as well as the fact that if you transformed into, say, a shuriken and didn’t have anyone around who knew about it in order to use a _kai_ on you and reverse the transformation, was why it had been sealed away in a storage scroll.  
  
Who had developed such a powerful jutsu, you might ask?  
  
Well, it’s pretty obvious who developed it, really.  
  
Orochimaru.  
  
As I thought about this, I frowned, my tail flicking in distaste. God, I hated that son of a bitch, but… well, he _did_ make a pretty damn interesting jutsu. I already found myself altering a lot of my plans. With this tool in my repertoire, a _hell_ of a lot could be accomplished that otherwise simply would not have been able to occur.  
  
…Also, it was cool to be able to turn into a girl at will. So, um, thanks, potentially pedophilic snake man?  
  
All that being said, it would probably confuse the hell outta whatever Jounin-sensei I was being given to find that the class had a catgirl in it, so I Perfect Transformed back into my normal body. I winced and let out a shaky breath from fatigue; thanks to some kekkei genkai training earlier today and how expensive this new Jutsu was, I was running really low. With my calculations, I could probably PT maybe… four times a day before I got too close to chakra exhaustion? Three or four times.  
  
Back in my cute femboy body, I made my way back to class, and waited dutifully for my Jounin-sensei to appear. Whoever the heck they were.  
  
Turns out, I didn’t have to wait very long, because my sensei was _extremely_ punctual.  
  
“DYNAMIC! ENTRY!”  
  
And loud.  
  
I gaped at the bowl cut, startlingly green jumpsuit, and grin that— _were those actual sparkles_!? And was that an _actual wave genjutsu_ behind him!?  
  
Oh no.  
  
Oh _no._  
  
“Is Kawase Ren-san here?” Maito Gai, smiling wider than Luffy himself, asked, scanning the crowd for me. His eyes fell on me, and I shrunk. _No, no, no._ It wasn’t that Gai was a bad person, hell no, it was just—he was so _loud_. And… and… youthful. “Come with me! I’ll be your new Jounin-sensei!”  
  
Ino shot me a look of amused pity. Shikamaru grumbled something about people being loud.  
  
If he’d try to get me into a green jumpsuit and bowl cut, I was actually committing seppuku.


End file.
